OSABC : Lions in Blue and Silver
by LogicalPremise
Summary: The story of the Legacy Team in the First Contact War : Ahern, Kyle, Florez, Chu, and Saracino. A pre-ME1 quickfic covering some of the OC's from the main story as they go up against the Turian Hierarchy and then struggle to adapt to the changing lives they are forced into by surviving. M for violence and Ahern's mouth.
1. Chapter 1

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of a Legacy, and how a legacy dies. _

* * *

_'The first combination of N-rate and S-Rate military forces was the team of Commodore Tradius Ahern, N7 leader of NCT Eleven, combined with that of Lord Commander Yonis Chu, commander of the AIS Reactive Force Corps. No existing team could pull together the required force, and this team had been as one long before, when they were all merely Marines._

_Tradius Ahern died in fire, defying death and spitting curses as he took out a force of Reaper Brutes and Banshees that would have crippled Hammer's final approach. Michael Saracino died smiling, having stopped a terrorist at the cost of his own life. Rachel Florez, we know now, died screaming and alone, a traitor to everything the SA should have stood for due to her loyalty to what the SA did stand for. Preston Kyle died in glorious revelation, opening the eyes of many to the fact that somewhere along the way, the SA had lost it's path. Yonis Chu died last week, at the age of sixty-seven, surrounded by family. _

_That they left a legacy behind cannot be denied. Kyle, Ahern and Florez all shaped and moulded Shepard, while Saracino's hatred of turians led to the darkening of Florez and of Cerberus moving beyond mere black ops. THe Ahern Doctrine, the Kyle Maneuver, the Chu Gambit - these are all enshrined in human military tactics, while the ships SCB Florez, SSV Chu and the dreadnaught Preston Kyle keep their names alive in a different way._

_But these five simple people were not mere legends. They stopped the turian advance at a time where all humanity was about to fall. They survived a trial that would have killed most people, in a day and age where humanity had no biotics, no omni-technology, no medigel, nothing but grit, skill, and determination. _

_We may disagree with the politics of Saracino, the rogue actions of Chu, the violent rejection and slaughter at the end by Kyle. We may curse Yonis Chu for his actions at Arotaht with the batarian relay. Many, I suspect, have already cursed Ahern for beating them into the ground during training._

_But we cannot discharge our burden of debt to them, to the bravery and courage it took for them to face the bared might of the entire Hierarchy with nothing more than guts and trust. _

_Marines, present arms! Color guard, honors to the dead, hymn five.'_

_\- Admiral David Anderson, at the dedication of the Memorial to the Legacy Team, two years after the end of the Reaper War._

* * *

_"I once asked Florez why she slept with Saracino, and she told me 'Mainly to make Kyle blush'. Bitch. - Tradius Ahern_

* * *

"Get up, boyo. No time for slackers in our glorious Corps."

The youthful face of Marine Captain Tradius Ahern glared at the heavily muscled form of Master Chief Free, cursing under his breath as he staggered back to his feet. Shaking his head once to clear it, he managed to step back into a ready position on the tatami mat, and bowed shallowly. "Ready, Master Chief." The bulky padding he wore on his shoulders and body make him feel sluggish as he hastily wiped a trickle of sweat out of his eyes.

The man in front of him towered over him, broad shoulders and thick arms mounted on a muscular barrel of a torso and legs like tree trunks. His head was almost absurdly small by comparison, thick brows and a jutting jaw the frame for a oft-broken nose and narrow, beady green eyes. His head was shorn, an Alliance 'A' tattoo on either temple, and he wore the undress bottoms of his BDU's with a crisp white undershirt barely dotted with sweat under the protective white leather vest.

"Ach, you're stiffer than a sailor in a whorehouse, boyo. Ye have to move your body with the motions, not hack about as if ye're swinging your kick like a bloody claymore." The big man flowed through a series of rapid, elegant attacks, ending with a rapid kick that elevated at the last second to swirl the air inches over Ahern's shorn scalp. "Ye're fast and ye're stubborn, and not full o' yerself, but ye still need to remember to stay focused."

Ahern nodded tightly. "Yes, Master Chief."

Free sighed, stretching slightly. "Yer – " He cut off his words, as the somewhat clunky communications pendant on his neckchain vibrated. Cursing, he placed it in his ear, eyes narrowing as he listened to some instructions that Ahern couldn't make out.

The master chief sighed. "Go rack yer gear and hustle up yer squad for evening PT after chow. Once yer done, go on leave early. Problems just came up and the brass needs me there pronto." The big man turned away, already dialing someone on his cell phone, and Ahern sighed.

Ahern nodded slowly, undoing the straps of his practice gi, even as he glanced around. Camp Lejune was the primary station for the training of all Systems Alliance marines, and on any given day was swarmed with new recruit battalions being run ragged by iron-hard drill instructors. The gleam of the arcology dome glimmered fitfully in the hazy sunlight that made it past the fouled atmosphere, the distant horizon revealing little but blackened sticks where lush forest once stood.

Earth, in the aftermath of the collapse of government and it's radical reconstruction during the Days of Iron, was not the same as the stories in old books. His father had lived through those sickening times, when humanity lost any claim to the word 'civilization' and people fought tooth and nail for mere survival. Sickness, radiation, pollution, and unrelenting wars had killed billions of people, left the atmosphere so acidic and foul it could not be inhaled for long periods without causing lung damage, and seared tens of thousands of square miles into radioactive wastelands or horrible murky toxic sludge.

As Ahern racked his gear, he thought about the things that his father spoke of, before. When the stars were just a thing to stare at in the night sky, instead of the destiny of humanity. A part of him was excited about humanity's future, and it was why he'd joined the Systems Alliance in the first place. Not for him the life of an arcology worker, or worse, a drudge on the barely livable moons of Jupiter, Saturn, or Neptune.

He wanted to get out and see space, to help humanity recover from it's stumble. His belief in the guidance of Lord Manswell and the Systems Alliance was absolute, and if the training he got as a marine was tough, it was only to make him a better protector. He'd enjoyed his years in the military so far, and had worked hard at being successful. His being promoted to captain at his age was nearly unheard of, but he'd heard flickers of whispers of lots of other promotions, and rumors of military expansion.

There wre plenty of reasons why, he supposed, the military would be expanding. The most obvious, of course, was that SA had found some trace of alien life.

Humanity, after all, did not have to wonder any longer if they were alone in the galaxy. The ruins discovered on Mars had unlocked technology beyond the wildest dreams of humanity – the ability to control energy itself, to manipulate mass and weight. Even the basics had turned human society on it's head , bringing about a world more akin to ancient science fiction stories than anything expected. Flying cars. Spaceships. Jumping between stars. Guns that shot farther and faster than gunpowder.

It had also opened the military's eyes to the fact that _something _had happened to the owners of all the tech left behind. And that if they were not alone, then someone might show up with a gun or six.

The SA had called for more marines, more sailors, more protectors, and Ahern – driven by his father's tales of a better time – had answered. It had not been easy. Like most marines, he'd graduated basic and spent a single two year tour on basic guard duty, in his case, Luna. The low gravity and lack of any threat meant he was out of shape, but he'd practiced his skills diligently, mastering not just the advanced rifle and pistol courses but actually outshooting one of the pistol instructors.

His efforts as a Sergeant in smashing a smuggling ring in his second deployment in the moons of Jupiter had gotten him a bit of media attention, and he'd upped that by increasing his skill with pistols, eventually outshooting even the famous Major Ralshon.

That little feat, along with his blossoming relationship with the daughter of Senator Dale Adkins, had gotten him tapped for a new experimental program being kicked off by the marines and (he suspected) his rather hasty promotion. The existing Special Forces, the Guard of Iron, were seen as too tightly associated with the family of Manswell to be fully adapted into the Alliance military.

While the Guard of Iron were indeed, elite, they were also weird. Alliance Command had decided to create an entirely new program for the next step in the military machine, and had selected some five thousand possible applicants.

Given that the last heavy fighting had tailed off almost fifteen years before he was even born, there were very few true 'veterans' to build a force from. Rather, the SA picked people who were young, with perfect records, and who demonstrated advanced skills. People who could be shaped into a first generation of special forces, and develop a living curriculum for further improvement.

Ahern wondered, as he walked towards his barracks, why exactly Special Forces might be needed, and it dovetailed with his concerns about what other races might be out in the galaxy. Humanity would be stupid to expect peaceful contact with something that might be entirely alien in both outlook and composition. Better to be safe than to be sorry, after all.

He arrived at the narrow barracks assigned to Echo-Three, his squad, and entered without knocking.

The barracks was simple and functional, as thousands upon thousands of Marines transitioned through Lejune every year – some staying on for training, others here for only a day or two for transfer processing or skills evaluation. Rather than stick such transients in dedicated barracks buildings or dorm-style rooms as they did permanent residents, they constructed single-squad units, arranged in neat squares around training grounds, food trucks, and transport stands.

It worked…but left much to be desired in terms of creature comforts. The barracks was about thirty feet long and half that wide, a good fifth of it taken up by the restroom and shower area at the back. Six heavy bunks, three to aside, took up the wall areas, along with heavy footlockers, while the middle was given over to a pair of tables, each with six seats. A simplified communications panel was installed next to the flat-panel TV flush with the wall.

His squad was already here.

Technical Sergeant Yonis Chu lay bonelessly on his bed, eyes closed lazily. The squad's communications specialist and tech, his features were a mix of his Ethopian mother and his Chinese father. Chu was related to the third most powerful Noble House in the Alliance, the House of Chu, but his was such a cadet branch that, combined with his mixed heritage, that he hardly considered himself noble. Technically, he was a Shang – the Chinese version of a marquis – but only Rachel called him Shang Chu, and then only to needle him. His dark hair was cut close and his narrow frame looked utterly relaxed even dressed in full BDU's.

Sitting on the bed next to him, her legs tucked away Indian-style, was Corporal Rachel Florez. A pretty young woman of mixed Hispanic and Japanese ancestry, her exotic features were fixed in boredom as she glanced up when he entered, before flicking back the manual in her hands. Florez was an enigma, sometimes flirty and lighthearted, sometimes bitchy and cutting. She was one of the two riflemen in the squad, well suited to digging into a fight. Fierce and competitive, she hated when men assumed she was weaker because she was female, and despite the big chip on her shoulder was always kinder when someone honestly complemented her. She kept her brown hair savagely tucked away in the SA bun, and her green eyes didn't stray from the tech manual she was reading.

Sitting at the table nearest him was the bulky, muscular form of Lieutenant Preston Kyle. Barely nineteen, the man was powerfully built, with long arms and legs and a graceful elegance in his motions, much like Master Chief Free. He looked up from trimming his hair before smiling gently. Hard and intelligent scanned Ahern before returning to his task. Kyle was weird, in many ways – the guy was a talented violinist and painter, doubled as both the squad medic and the squad's other rifleman, and could probably out shoot Ahern and outfight Florez at the same time. Yet he was incredibly humble, self-effacing, and almost fragile.

Snorting to himself, Ahern glanced further back. As usual, the other lazy ass, Chief Michael Saracino, was out like a light. Lanky and awkward, Saracino was hardly what one expected when they thought of Marines. His conditioning was weak, his hand to hand ability nil, and his discipline problems legendary.

He was also, even at only 20, the deadliest sniper in the entire Systems Alliance, famous for making a killshot to a terrorist from a staggering 1.9 kilometers. While fragmentary pre-Iron records existed showing a longer shot had been made in those days, Saracino had taken his shot while under heavy fire, from a moving vehicle, and in heavy rain. His promotions had been one of rewards for his skill, not due to his leadership ability or military bearing.

With a grin, Ahern slammed his foot down next to the bed, sending Saracino jolting into full wakefulness and drawing a sigh from Chu. Florez merely sighed. "What's up, Cap?"

Ahern smiled. "Chow and PT, and then early leave. Master Chief Free got a call in the middle of our beatdown session. Report back here at 0800 Monday unless something changes."

Saracino sighed. "Can't we skip the workout, Captain? Seriously, my shoulder is killing me and those hacks at Medical said it's fine."

Kyle frowned. "Exercise is a part of our daily curriculum. We can't just circumvent it." He gave a smile, and Saracino rolled his eyes.

"Kyle, you should go into toothpaste advertisements rather than the military –"

Ahern sighed. "Shut the fucking hell up, Saracino. I swear –"

Saracino interrupted. "Yes, all the time!"

Ahern opened his mouth, then closed it, then glanced at Rachel. "Why haven't you killed him for annoying you yet?"

Florez smirked. "He thinks I'm pretty."

Ahern rolled his eyes. "So's a goddamned eezo flare. I'd rather kiss that, more likely to have lips afterwards." He clapped his hands. "Exercise gear and let's hit the tarmac in ten. Quicker we get done, quicker I can get showered and head out on the town."

They mumbled (except Kyle) but obeyed, and Ahern headed to the back to dig out his own gear when Chu caught his arm gently. "What did the Master Chief leave for, if you know?"

Ahern shrugged. "Dunno, some kind of call. Why?"

The man looked troubled. "After PT, we will talk. I heard something disturbing to day and wish to know your thoughts, Captian."

Ahern nodded, then sighed and nodded. "After PT, then."

* * *

**_Author's Notes:_**

_This is not likely to be a long fic, but I don't know. It's the story of several characters - my versions of Tradius Ahern and Preston Kyle, along with three OC's – Rachel Florez, Yonis Chu, and Michael Saracino – who broke through turian lines in the mission Ahern descrbes in the Pinnacle Station DLC in ME1. _

_In my version, the mission was to prevent a turian fleet from getting a huge advantage, and was a huge turning point in the First Contact War. Given the importance of Kyle, Florez, and Chu (and I guess Ahern) to the main fic series I write, having this side piece might be interesting reading for some people. It is generally far more upbeat and less morally gritty than my other works, along with people who are, gasp, actually fairly well adjusted, except for Ahern's Tourette's Syndrome._

_Notable cameos are Jack Harper, a bit-appearance from Matriarch Benezia after the big fight, and possible both Saren and Tetrimus (prior to his fall from grace). _

_Ideas and scenes you'd like to see are welcome suggestions._


	2. Chapter 2

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of beer, and how the Cowboys suck. _

* * *

Ahern sat down wearily at the bar. "Sam , couple of Coors, if you please. Goddamned shitty day." He tossed a plastic ManswellSecure debit card on the scarred wood, and the bartender picked it up with a smile, replacing it with two bottles.

_Sam's Last Stand_ was a tiny hole-in-the-wall establishment frequented by few officers. Crouched in the ruins of what was left of Jacksonville, North Carolina, it was one of a handful of badly reconstituted buildings dating back to the Days of Iron.

The US Marines had held their chain of command together better than other US military units, and had protected the last dregs of the United States federal government in horrific last stands at Cheyanne Mountain, Arlington National Cemetary, and at the wreckage of Camp Lejune. Outnumbered and outgunned, they'd fought the Guard of Iron until the last man, and even those hardbitten mercenaries and ex-criminals had remembered.

When the SA resurrected Camp Lejune, preserving as much of the rich history of the US Marine Corps, it also brought about the creation of an arcology area. Hardbitten survivors, relying on air filtration equipment cobbled together from old air conditioning equipment and shielding against UV and rads based on scrapped cars filled with scrap lead and beach sand had been the only people living in Jacksonville, and the SA had generously exfiltrated them all for better medical care.

Except one, a crusty and ancient US Marine command master sergeant calling himself Sam.

The man, half blind and suffering from malnutrion, skin cancer, burned lungs and all other sorts of ailments, had snarled down SA recovery teams, and point blank told them he'd leave when he was dead, he had a damned bar to run. Rather than force the old man off, the general in charge of the setup had found him amusing, and in return for him providing SA historians some assistance with remembering the honor and courage of the US marines, refurbished the area nearest Lejune as a civilian area, getting the man enough medical aid to live on another dozen years before passing the bar along to a retiring SA marine also named Sam. The act of passing it along to a fellow Marine became tradition, and the current owner was the Third Sam in the line.

Most of the rest of Little Jacksonville was done up modern architecture, but those who followed in Sam's footsteps had stubbornly kept the décor as it was. So the ceiling was a mix of hand-mixed tar pitch and corregudated steel, dim and rickety florescent lighting casting pools of dim radiance over a handful of battered old Bruinswick pool tables. The flatscreens on both walls were modern, of course, but the floor was solid oak plank, ancient and scarred, stained with years of beer, blood, and dirt.

Curious relics of a bygone age – street signs, bits of ecletic décor, parts of an old pre-Iron tank – were strewn about on the walls like proud trophies from the most demented hunt possible. The beer was strong, the waitresses were curvy and liable to break your jaw if you got grabby, and the rules were simple : leave brawling and guns at the door. Drink, watch football or baseball, play pool, bitch about the SA, but no fighting.

With a slow smile Ahern nursed his beer, wearing plain BDU undress with no rank markings. By long established tradition, that was a sign that he was indeed an officer, but he didn't give a shit about being one at the moment. Any officer who came in here in full uniform was liable to be asked to depart unless he was here on business.

Enlisted men sat at the battered booths around the edge of the room, or at the bar, muttering about drill instructors, orders they didn't like, or the absolute fun of patrols beyond the arcology boundaries. Much of North America was a radioactive hellhole, with all kinds of mutations making diseases and the environment lethal. Any animals that survived such hellish condtions tended to carry all kinds of filth – a simple bite of a rabid wild cat had killed a marine a few days back, ignoring the strongest antibiotics available.

Ahern was gladder than ever now he'd done his shit-patrolling on the moon. Food sucked, and the pay was bad, but you wouldn't worry about being eaten by goddamned mutant _things_ with claws as thick as rifle in the swamp-forest sludge that now consumed most of the old American South.

The door to the bar swung open, revealing Yonis Chu in civilian clothes. A pair of battered jeans and a simple black shirt, with SA combat boots and his dog tags hanging out, was all he wore, and he sat down with Ahern tiredly, taking the proffered beer.

"Tradius … this is the worst bar in the entire base. Maybe the entire continent. Quite possibly the entire universe. Why do you always, always come here?"

Ahern smiled. "I know! I fucking love it. Won't ever be a goddamned gentleman, so why waste time pretending? Beer is good, I don't have to worry about running into some prick of an officer telling me off about my fucking language, and the nachos are to die for." He swigged, wiping foam from his lips as he paid half attention to the football game on the far wall. "Fucking Cowboys…."

Cho rolled his eyes. "I would make a horribly culturally insensitive remark here… but I figure it would go right over your head. I'll simply say this is not exactly the sort of establishment officers – or noble sons – are expected to visit."

Ahern smirked. "A thousand apologies, milord. Please grant your grace unto this humble peasant—"

A long suffering sigh emitted from Chu, who then pulled out his data-tablet. "Listen. I got a call today, to head into HQ. There were people from the AIS there, doing interviews. Recruiting."

Ahern frowned. AIS was the spooks, the Alliance Intelligence Services. Some bigshot Manswell had taken over the group and was working on breaking up gangs and terrorist cells. The Black Hats were scary as fuck but usually didn't bother the rank and file unless you did something stupid, but the AIS investigated everybody.

Ahern sipped his beer. "Any ideas as to what they were looking for?"

Chu shrugged. "Sort of. They interviewed Saracino already, so I was trying to figure out if they reached out to you."

Ahern shook his head. "Nope. Fuckers are probably looking for new spooks, after that shit that went down in Azlan blew up in their faces." He tilted his head. "Why bring this up?"

Chu gestured to the datapad. "I've been using the Family connections to do some digging. Something big is up. They just had another freighter explode, this time INSIDE the Calcutta arcology. Almost half a million people exposed to eezo. Thousands have already died."

Chu scrolled. "Less than nine hours after the second bombing, the Senate voted on a package for almost a billion dollars to 'clear off available land in the Brazila Protectorate Zone for advanced warfighting training.' Brazil, Tradius. There's nothing there but ruins and glass now. Why Brazil?"

Ahern shrugged. "Why the fuck should I know or care? I don't sign on to your loony goddamned conspiracy theories, Yonis. Remember the one about thinking the SA transferred you to my combat squad to have Saracino bump you off?"

Chu flushed, and folded his arms. "I never said…never mind. Look. So I've been wrong before. Leapt to conclusions. This is not the same thing."

Ahern tilted his head, then took a swig. "Why not?"

Chu tapped his pad. "The package to investigate the formation of elite units, special forces? Tied to this rider. So is an expansion of the AIS budget to hire five thousand new agents. And along with that to mothball over two hundred older ships and lay down the keels on five hundred replacements with the newer drives and the A-series of kinetic barrier shields that just hit the production lines. Billions, maybe tens of billions of dollars worth of investment. The SA is stingy at the best of times, so why throw money around all of a sudden?"

He glanced around. "Family Chu is nervous. They just announced yesterday a FIFTEEN year moratorium on any more Mass Relay openings after Shanxi's far Relay scheduled for next year."

Ahern shrugged. "It's above my paygrade. I think about fighting, fucking, and finding a place to eat and sleep. Anything beyond that, Yonis, can be put off."

Chu arched an eyebrow. "You really don't even wonder? At the expansion, the way they're throwing money away?"

Ahern drained his beer and signaled for another, pausing only to smile vindictively as the QB for the Cowboys was sacked hard enough that his helmet went flying. "Honestly, Yonis? I figure either some stupid asshat on one of the outer big colonies did something stupid like rebel, or we've got some indication of aliens. That means focusing on fighting and staying alive. I was actually thinking about it earlier." He shrugged. "I don't have a reason to care."

Chu shrugged. "I do. When I got tapped for this whole thing, with your squad, the op against the terrorists, it was the first time I got to really fight. When you put together this idea about getting into the Special Forces, I went along because I figured it would be interesting, but the AIS sounds even _more_ interesting."

Ahern realized now where this was going, and grimaced. In less than a week, the SA would start the trials for the squads that would attend training to become elites. There were no real details yet – if Chu was right, the facility they would be training in was still to be built.

But a good showing would enable a definite slot in the training and building of such a special ops group. That's what Ahern wanted, and to get it he needed the best team possible. He figured he could probably get by with two people he didn't know as well as Chu or Saracino, but it would mess up everything for Rachel and Kyle.

Ahern opened his fresh beer. "How long until they expect an answer? The AIS, that is."

Chu shrugged uncomfortably. "They wanted an answer today. I told them about my situation – with the squad, with my Family - and they said they'd be in touch. But if they call me up tomorrow and ask me in or out, well. I'm not sure there's a place for me in the SA military in a war, Tradius. I'm a good fighter, not great. I'm good at comms, but not … well, not the absolute best. I'm pretty good at ECM remote hacking, but not great…"

Ahern snorted. "I'm sorry, I can't hear you very well over the sound of your false fucking modesty. _Bastard_."

Chu laughed, but quickly sobered. "Look, I don't wanna cut out on you guys. We've been through a lot together, and even if Kyle is Jesus Christ Reborn and Saracino makes me want to choke him, I find that am comfortable." He paused, examining his beer bottle.

When he spoke, his voice was lower, more bitter. "Pretty sure Saracino won't want to join anyway. Y'know with the … Rachel and all." He exhaled. "But I'll be straight with you. My name means I won't have a real career in the Marines, and you know it. They aren't going to let even a minor son of the Third House die in a ditch somewhere, and if they do, I think it would be to incite the Family into some kind of action. So I either rot in a base or get made into a sacrifice. That's not a future I can get behind!"

Ahern nodded, glancing at the game again. Chu continued. "And you know Saracino will be wasted even in special forces, assuming he doesn't pop off at the mouth and get knifed in a bar."

Ahern grinned. "Maybe he will. Couldn't hurt the gene pool. Jesus Christ, can you imagine what kind of asshole a kid of Michael Saracino would be?"

Chu frowned. "I am being serious."

Ahern exhaled heavily and shook his head. "Alright. Shit, maybe you are right. We got this thing going because I wanted the best. You're the best at what you do, and so is he. Making the transfers, the drills, the bullshit. Getting it all set up and good to go it took a lot of time, Yonis. You walk away from this and while I can't say it will blunt my chances much, Florez and Kyle don't have other skills neccesary to get picked up."

He narrowed his eyes. "Before today I'd say you were rock solid about the chance to get in on the ground floor of an SA special ops group. Now you're full of doubts. Is this really about the possibility that shit is going to get real, or is it more about the chance that you can get out from under the boot of your old man if you vanish into an AIS spookhouse?"

Chu shrugged. "They aren't mutally exclusive. I'll stick until the AIS asks me again, maybe just getting through these trials or exams or whatever they have planned will get you the call. But I won't tie myself down, Tradius."

Ahern only nodded, silent for a long moment. Then he tipped his beer in Chu's direction. "Ah, fuck it. Yonis, if it fucking happens, it fucking happens. We had a good year together, kicking ass and taking names. It got us this far, got us all promotions – even if Rachel lost hers by being stupid and pouty. If you can get your shit into the order you want, fuck! Go for it." He drank deeply.

Yonis nodded, taking his first sip of the beer. "I sense a 'but' , Trahern."

The other marine shrugged. "Assuming you are right. Assuming shit is coming down the line. Aliens, rebellions, or the return of the ghost of motherfucking undead Ardiente. I'm not sold on this idea that the SA is building up for a threat. It could be the corps pulling their strings, could be the colonies need more work and we're just building up to a sustainable economy."

He frowned. "But if you are right, buddy, you'll just be the tip of a different spear than I will, Yonis. Is that really what you want? The AIS isn't going to let you sit in a nice comfy office and play whack-a-conspiracy with your brain. Saracino, for all his goofy bullshit, is a fucking killer. The AIS is looking for the same thing as the Corps. No guarantee they won't sacrifice you either, you know. Mutally shitty outcomes if you ask me."

The lanky man shrugged himself. "I have no idea what I want. Except to get away from bullshit. The way the Family acts is … too much for me. And frankly? I don't mind a fight, I simply feel that I'm less likely to end up as cannon fodder on the front lines of some fucking colonial revolt if I'm in the AIS."

Ahern chuckled. "Profanity? From you? Fucking incredible." Another sip of beer. "Alright. Lemme see if I can talk to old man Adkins and get him to unclamp some info. If you're right? If shit is coming? I'd take the AIS job. If it's not, then you should at least stick around long enough for our team to make it to the SpecOps. That's all I'm asking."

Chu sighed. "I.. alright, Trahern. I'll do that." He took another tentative sip of the beer, then grimaced. "Not exactly Riesling."

"Limp-wristed slant-eyed uppity fop."

"Uncultured cretinous savage."

The two clinked bottles.

* * *

**_Author's Notes:_**

_Things are moving along slowly. _


	3. Chapter 3

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of unintended consequences, and of paranoid preparations_

* * *

Ahern sat, brooding.

The assembly hall at Camp Lejune was massive, almost a mile long and at least half a mile wide, supported by the primitive mass-effect repulsor pillars that hummed and bulked here and there along the walls. Banners of ancient military units that formed the core of the current SA military thinking – American Marines, German Heer, Japanese SDF – were set in positions of honor atop the high sides of the platform at the front and center of the building.

Huge murals depicting scenes of valor and bravery had been sprayed upon the massive long walls, making the entire hall look like a disjointed version of Valhalla, given the fact that there were thousands of seated soldiers arranged in semicircular rows around the central plinth.

Ahern pulled at the collar of his dress blues irritably. The new SA uniform had moved away from the mix of Marine and Heer designs, to a new blue abomination trimmed in gold and with actual leather paneling. He felt like some kind of third-rate fascist goon in this getup, and it didn't help that the Commissariat version looked similar except for high boots and that it had been designed by the Boss-Armani Corporation.

Hugo Boss had not only designed the uniforms of the Nazi SS, but the Sao Paulo Guard. Ahern felt very strongly that giving them a contract for the SA uniform was just asking for trouble, but no one asked him.

The previous week had been one of polishing existing skills, getting uniforms up to spec, and endless completion of all manner of paperwork. Although paperless options were uquibitous, like Greentooth wireless datapads and voice-driven constructed-intellect systems that could almost beat a Turing test simply asking the questions and recording them, the SA insisted on paper.

Tradition, they said. Goddamned backassward waste of time and trees, he said. And given that there were more people than trees on fucking Earth nowdays, paper seemed especially stupid.

It was worth all the hassle, though. Out of some fifty-seven thousand applicants, only five thousand had been chosen for Phase One. A thousand five-man teams. Of those thousand teams, a good two hundred had already been eliminated and dismissed, and another three hundred reassigned to other postings with promotions. A nice bonus, to be sure, but not the holy grail of SpecOps. Putting up with the paper had cut the competition in half.

By the end of the week, Ahern knew their number would be decimated or worse – rumor had it that they were really only looking for maybe ten teams, or fifty men.

The best one percent, out of the best one percent. That was a motto he could get behind. A little more badass than merely 'the best of the best'.

He glanced around the table at the faces of his teammates. Yonis was reading his datapad. Kyle was checking his uniform for the nine hundredth time. Saracino was staring at Florez, who appeared to be meditating.

He didn't have any real concerns about Yonis Chu. The man was both book-smart and crafty, and while his dedication to the plan was wavering a bit, he had known Yonis all his life. If it really came down to it, he fully expected Yonis to tell the AIS to go fuck themselves, and then use his name to get in later on if it turned out SpecOps wasn't his cup of tea.

Yonis had a big thing for conspiracies, and maybe their conversation yesterday was his way of just letting Tradius know how nervous he was. He'd dealt with Old Man Chu enough times to realize that the Family Elder was not really human, but a massive walking penis cunningly disguised in human shape. Anyone who set up his own father to be killed off by the Commissariat and then complained when the life insurance didn't come through wasn't worth pissing on if they were on fire.

For Chu go into a safe career in the Marines as some aide-de-camp or d'attache affairs was one thing. To get involved in highly dangerous Special Operations or the AIS was another, and Chu had a point that the AIS would have much better luck in fending off Old Man Chu's outrage once he learned the truth than a brand new command with no big Names backing it. Hell, half the reason Ahern had asked Yonis to join is that he'd be the biggest Name in the unit.

None of that affected Yonis' ability to perform, which is all Ahern really cared about.

Kyle, of course, looked immaculate, posture perfect, eyes glinting with intelligence. Bastard probably slept three hours a night. On paper, Kyle was the most likely shoo-in for the SpecOps. Brilliant, multi-talented, and a physical god, Kyle could master anything in short order. His flexibility would allow him to thrive, while his combination of mental and physical excellence was exactly what typified the best special operations soldiers of the past. The fact that he would be a perfect poster-boy for whatever crumbs of truth the public got fed wouldn't hurt either. Performance wise, Kyle would be as close to humanly perfect as possible. No worries … at least in terms of that.

Kyle's biggest problem was his lack of confidence. He wasn't a leader, preferring to follow someone else's lead. His promotion to Lieutenant was pro-forma BS to snap up good officer material and Kyle knew it, knew he hadn't earned the bars the way so many other LT's had. And Ahern didn't think he would ever find that confidence, until he went up against something he was sure he couldn't do and actually did it.

Then he'd either be a truly dangerous soldier … or completely fucking insufferable.

Ahern grunted. Rachel Florez had the opposite problem, she was cocky. She was good and she knew it, she was beautiful and she knew it, she was smart and she knew it. An intimidating woman who'd dragged herself up from slums and deprivation to where she was today, Florez couldn't even spell 'modesty', much less feel it. Her arrogance and mouth had gotten her busted back from Chief to Sergeant to Corporal, and it wasn't the first time.

Rachel had a chip on both shoulders, and a part of Ahern – the quiet part he liked to kick in the head and tell to shut up – admitted she probably was justified in having said chips. A yakuza father and a prostitute of a mother didn't equal a nice childhood, and Florez was just a touch too hardened around the boys when it came to dirty jokes or seeing them naked – he suspected she'd sold herself when she was younger. Like most pretty women, too many guys assumed she was just looks, but her fierce intellect took that as an insult. Her temper needed work. Her ability to accept that others could beat her needed work. Most of all, her assumptions that she was the baddest motherfucker in the valley of the shadow of death really had to go.

The fact she was banging her teammate didn't help in Ahern's book. Michael Saracino wasn't really a complicated guy. He could kill you with a pistol at six hundred feet or shoot a playing card in half at a hundred yards. Turned where the narrow edge was towards you. But around people, Saracino was an ass. He'd been through some kind of hell when he was younger and more than once woken up in the middle of the night, screaming or crying. Michael's back had enough ugly scarring on it for him to draw his own conclusions. Instead of curling up or being shy, Michael instead lashed out with hard, cutting sarcasm. It was rarely funny, often hurtful or insulting, and the guy was a master at finding just the one thing to push people over the edge.

The problem wasn't his past or background. If he had been some emo, woe-is-me loser, Ahern would not have picked him, no matter how good he could shoot. No, the man just pretended his past didn't hurt or matter, and that he didn't care about what people thought of him. He had no filters and refused to care about consequences of anything he did. He was the best sniper in the world, and other than that, he seemed not to need much else.

His thoughts interrupted by an increase in noise, Ahern glanced up as murmurs around them rose in value, seeing some brass arrive and set up at a table beside the main podium. No one was addressing the gathered teams though, and none of the officers approached the mike, so he shrugged.

He returned to his thoughts on Saracino. He and Rachel had been doing shit off and on for the past year. Rachel said it was nothing serious, just some fun in the sack. Saracino made sarcastic off-color jokes. But Ahern didn't buy that shit. Saracino was broken somewhere inside, somewhere that drove him to find peace by blowing people's heads off. That kind of broken pushed everyone away. Rachel had pushed through that barrier and Ahern doubted Saracino took that lightly. If she bought it, God help the fucking galaxy, because the only thing that scared Ahern was the idea of a mentally unstable sniper on a rampage.

Rachel had one pathetically easy thing about her, she adored honest praise. Saracino couldn't bullshit to save his own life, and if he'd reached her as well as she'd reached him …

They were both needy people. Ahern didn't like needy people.

As a rule, he always felt that if you couldn't get your shit together without someone wiping your ass for you, you were a goddamned waste of oxygen. Lots of people called that cold, but Ahern called it fucking life. Crying about things only wasted time you could spend moving on and finding something to not goddamned cry about, like getting laid, smashing drunk, into a good fight, or…something. Anything.

They lived on a dying world full of toxic shit, where poor people starved every day so some fucker with six names and a coat of arms could have a holographic opera house added to his summer home. They had a government that did nothing to fix it because the founding fathers made it impotent on purpose, because some nutjob in Brazil tried to take over the world and another nutjob in Germany actually succeeded. They had colonies they abused because, hey, he who owns the guns wins the argument.

The SA had lots of fucking problems, and life sucked ass. Then you died and rotted into slime in a shitty coffin until they made a golf course over you, and some rich asshole pissed on your remains as he wondered why his slice was so bad. There was shit-all nothing he or anyone else could do about it, and pissmoaning over it like some kind of child only made you miss out on opportunities to enjoy life or make something of yourself. Doing so over some bullshit like 'people don't like me' was absolutely infuriating to Ahern.

People who demanded that their lives be validated by the opinions of others – usually strangers – completely baffled Ahern. He wasn't obnoxious about it like Saracino, but he couldn't have given less of a fuck what other people who weren't his close friends thought about him.

He couldn't do anything about Rachel and Saracino, but what they were doing out of a need for someone else's approval was going to be problematic down the line. He was lost in thought trying to figure out how to deal with the issue when another team sat down at the table next to them.

Three of the team were black males, all heavily built, all marine lieutenants. A young blond woman with bright blue eyes sat next to the biggest of the guys, while a hard-faced asian man sat across from her, eyes flicking about in narrow assessment.

The oldest-looking of the lieutenants smiled as he walked over to Ahern. "I'm guessing it hasn't begun yet?"

Ahern shook his head. "Nope. Wish they'd hurry up, the damned game is on."

The man smiled. "Lieutenant David Anderson, Second Marine, Thanas."

Ahern gave him a firm handshake. "Captain Tradius Ahern, First _Solguard_."

The lieutenant winced. "Well, hell. Didn't think we'd be up against that kind of competition. Figured the _Solguard _would already consider themselves pretty special."

Ahern snorted. "Yeah , well. We don't get the kind of action we'd like sitting pretty in Sol, you know, unless it's terrorists." He gestured towards the stage. "Any idea what the hold up is?"

Anderson shook his head, his wide features turning into a small grimace. "No, they haven't really handed down that much information since the last of the tests. Most people think we're going to do live-fire exercise evaluations. I wouldn't be worried, except two of my best people are being poached by the AIS."

Ahern raised his eyebrow at this. "Huh, you too. They're after a couple of mine."

Anderson nodded, then frowned. "I wonder if this entire event is not only for the recruiting of a special ops force, but some kind of military distaff for the AIS as well. It isn't as if they would just hold an open spy job fair, after all."

Ahern laughed at that. "That would be fucking hilarious." He was about to say something else when finally another knot of officers approached the podium.

The man in the middle was one everyone knew by a mere glance. His broad shoulders were surmounted with the broad white, gold and red of the Grand Admiral of the Fleet, and the blood red ribbon around his neck was proof positive of his identity. Everyone in the entire hall shot to instant attention.

Admiral Jon Grissom looked around the huge auditorium for several seconds before speaking. "As you were, marines." He waited for the rustle of noise to subsume before continuing.

"You are all here as part of an ongoing evolution by the Systems Alliance military. You all have been carefully vetted, examined, and evaluated. Your loyalty, intelligence, and potential are the best humanity has to offer. "

He paused, smiling thinly. "It's time we all discussed what you were really brought here for. One thing we have been doing is ensuring this group can be trusted with sensitive information. The information about to be presented is, I assure you, very sensitive."

Grissom touched a control on the podium, and a series of projectors on the ceiling fired up, coming together to throw an image of a mass relay hanging in the blackness of space. "Almost three months ago, Explorer Corps Vessel SAV Discovery performed primary relay activation on the relay in the Tiptree system. Upon relay stabilization, we discovered a G-class star with what had once been five worlds."

He clicked, and the image shifted to that of a vast asteroid belt. "The system appeared to be dead at first, like most such systems we come across. However, the SAV Discovery picked up element zero readings in multiple areas of the asteroid belt, along with faint traces on the third planet. A closer investigation discovered very troubling elements."

"The third planet had once borne life, my fellow marines. Someone bombarded it with radioactive saturation bombs and kinetic strikes until every single continental plate was broken and the mantle was exposed. The asteroid belt contains enough organic and heavy nickel-iron content to make us believe it was also a planet, one that was hit hard enough to reduce it to rubble."

"From radio-carbon dating on some of the organic material we found on the third world, this atrocity was conducted well within the last two thousand years. We have only fragmentary evidence of what happened. The other relay out of the system was … damaged. It appears some form of bomb or high-energy emissive device was used to deactivate it. There is a great deal of highly vaporized wreckage near the mass relay which we have determined are the bits and pieces of space ships."

Grissom faced them, his features iron hard. "From our best extrapolation, one race entered the system, overpowered their fleets, and then literally destroyed their worlds. Before the aggressor could escape, however, the race being attacked managed to destroy the relay leading out of the system away from us. The backlash from this appears to have destroyed every spaceship in the system as well as heavy damage to the gas giant nearby, which is missing three quarters of it's mass. It is … possible .. that the fourth planet was NOT shattered by bombardment, but by the failure and sabotage of the mass relay."

"Our scientists, the AIS, and the Manswell Security Force have all been active in the Shiva System, as we are calling it, for the past month. We have found fragmentary bodies and pieced together some rough idea of what the races involved look like."

Two outlandish shapes flashed on the screen. "The one of the left, currently codenamed Contact Alpha, is what we believe to be a reptilian carnivore. Assuming the boffins didn't get the reassembly wrong, this creature would have stood almost nine feet tall, two mouths full of teeth, and scaled hide two inches thick. Amazingly, this appears to have been the victim race, not the aggressor."

"Contact Beta is harder to reconstruct. We assume it is bipedal, like us, although the legs seem very strange and the torso is off. It has a somewhat lizard-like, somewhat avian appearance, although we suspect they are coldblooded. The teeth are needle-like and sharp, and claws a good seven to eight inches long were found, coated with metal and electronics of very advanced make. The ships they came on are too wrecked to salvage much from, but we are working on fragments of technology we found on a few corpses."

Grissom glanced back at the crowd of marines. "There is alien life out in the stars, my brothers and sisters. And they are even nastier that we are. " 

* * *

**_Author's Notes:_**

_In case you are wondering, yes, those are turians. As described in the Cerberus Files (my AU history) before their discovery by the Citadel types, turians expanded through a mix of FTL and relay travel. And they got into it with one race:_

_'Their FTL wanderings were done in overwhelming, crushing force. They would not open a relay until they had a complete war fleet prepared, and refused to colonize except with full resources. They came across two other sentient races in their expansion. The first of these, the arcaeas, engaged in combat with them and were literally obliterated. Turian warships crushed their fleets and rained asteroid strikes down on their homeworld until not even algae-analogues survived. They strip mined the planet brutally, deliberately crushing cultural relics and left the world a burning, plundered wreck , a stark warning to others. Or so the history claims. No one can find the world the arcaeas hailed from, and I suspect the turians may have a darker secret they are hiding about the ultimate fate of this race.'_

_The Turians genocided the Arcaeas, but the big lizaards got the last laugh, blowing up their Mass Relay. This killed everything in the system, although it wasn't a total blowup like the event in Arothot by Shepard in Arrival. The other end of the relay never got opened or examined by the Arcaeas, and the turians never had the chance to open it. _

_Centuries later, humans open the other end, and find the mess. When they run across turians again, this pre-knowledge is one hinge point in why my AU is different than canon. They see the turians as genocidal monsters already, and thus surrender is not seen as a feasable option. _


	4. Chapter 4

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of mystery upon the stars, and eighty percent casualty rates_

* * *

Ahern had often heard the phrase 'hear a pin drop' to talk about absolute silence. To him, it was stupid – you might hear a pin hit the ground, but you certainly wouldn't hear it dropping through the air, no matter how quiet it was.

The silence that enfolded the assembly hall in the wake of Jon Grissom's blunt announcement of hostile alien life, however, made him seriously reconsider that. Nobody spoke – hell, nobody seemed to breathe.

Grissom's gritty voice lanced out. "Based on a combination of wreckage found and what we extrapolated from some very degraded electronic storage media found in the system, the AIS and the Manswell Institute of Mechanical Arts have come up with very rough estimates of what we're facing. While not a single ship was actually salvageable, a few were at least structurally semi-intact."

More images flashed up, showing wire-frame models of sleek arrow shaped ships with raptor-like wings and heavy center-line hulls. "We've identified at least two models of what we think is a frigate or light destroyer, and one that's a capital class ship eleven times bigger than our heavy cruiser. For now, we're calling this a battleship, like the old naval vessels. While we have no information on weapons or defenses, the sheer size of the craft is far more than we can achieve with our understanding of material science and mass displacement."

Grissom gave a cool smile. "Also keep in mind these ships may be over five hundred years old, which means if we run into these customers in the near future they will be even more advanced."

He touched the controls of podium again, bringing up a silhouette display of a human male and the more bird-like alien. The alien towered over the human by a good foot, with wider shoulders and a thicker chest. "The aliens appear to be extremely robust. While obviously most of the corpses we recovered were in extremely bad shape – vacuum damage and blunt trauma – we can draw a few inferences."

"The raptors, as we have decided to nickname Contact Beta, are larger and we presume stronger than us. Fragments of weapons and armor found indicate they use mass accelerators like we do, but instead of ballistic propulsion of tiny bits of metal, their weapons seem to hurl small packets of compressed particles. Our scientists think this sort of weapon would perform similarly to heavy ammunition, except with an explosive factor."

"The ship wreckage shows traces of eezo, so their propulsion systems are probably similar to ours. We did get lucky and find a mostly working kinetic barrier generation device on one of their combatants that we're working to reverse engineer right now. As you can imagine, personal kinetic shields have been something pursued by the SA for some time, but our most promising models last for a few minutes and can't stop heavy or repeated fire."

"We're still prototyping and testing, my fellow marines, but we think this little device can bounce at least light rifle fire for some time before shield integrity is lost."

Grissom clicked the podium again, displaying a star-map. "Right now, the only relays left that we haven't unlocked are in the Polo, Horizon, and Shanxi systems. Given that both Polo and Horizon are towards the direction the raptors are believed to have come from, we've locked those relays down tight. The Senate is authorizing laying down new hulls to form the core of a Third Fleet, which will secure both systems and ensure anything coming through those gates gets a very warm welcome. We still plan to open the relay in Shanxi later on, but after that we will not open further relays until the Fleet is prepared."

Grissom touched the control, the image shifting to an information graphic. "The Systems Alliance has no intention of being blindsided by potentially hostile aliens. Our caution regarding the relays is not going to stop anything that decides to open them up from the far side. While we would all hope that when we make contact with aliens that said contact will be peaceful, it's foolish to assume such will be the case. We will need to be prepared, both for peaceful contact and hostile contact."

"Obviously, no one expects Marines to handle diplomacy, so you boys and girls don't need to worry about that half of the operation. If things go Brazil on us, though … then we need to be prepared for some serious war-fighting. That is why the push is being made to develop a Special Ops unit."

Grissom gripped the podium, eyes intense. "I will not lie to you, Marines. The training we have laid out is the most intense and complete program ever undertaken by human soldiers. We drew on lessons from both the American Army and the German Heer, along with insights from other past military units. The force we envision developing will have to be able to fight not only harder and better, but smarter, than regular marines, or any other human force in history."

He tapped the control, displaying a set of matte-black heavy combat armor, with white and red striping down one arm. "We've tentatively named this special ops group Code N. The group will be organized along strict cellular command structures – four teams answering to a coordinating officer, who himself answers directly to both Marine and AIS overseers for target planning and logistics. Code N will have superior access to experimental weapons, armor, and cyberware, as well as the new line of genetic modification viral therapy being tested by the University of Vancouver."

"We do this because we estimate in conflict with alien beings of superior technology that Code N would face casualty rates of higher than 80% in some cases."

Ahern winced, and saw looks of concern on many faces, but not any real shock. Despite years of study, the boffins working on the Mars Archive couldn't even understand a tenth of what the Forerunners had left behind. It was clear humanity had lots of catching up to do, and a glance back to pre-Iron times when less advanced human cultures had run into more advanced ones showed that eighty percent casualties would be an understatement if anything.

Grissom straightened. "This is why you are here. As I said earlier, we've picked the best of our forces, those with the most potential, the most drive, the best skills. All of you have tasted battle, fighting pirates, terrorists, and back-land native life. You've fought in zero-g, in radiated valleys, on worlds far from Sol. To even have made it this far, you have had to demonstrate excellence."

"But we can't afford to kit out twenty-five hundred marines as special forces soldiers, or even half that number. Based on our limited number of trainers, the cost of gear, and the realization that we can't tear all of the best and brightest out of our military, the SA command has decided we will be fielding a smaller number of special forces teams. Specifically, ten teams will be chosen to form N-Series combat teams, or NCT's."

Grissom gestured to the man standing to his right, wearing a gray-tinted version of the new standard dress uniform and the epaulets of a general. "General Izunami is with the AIS. Along with the teams we plan to recruit for service with Code N, ten teams of specialized soldiers for infiltration and recon will be recruited for Code S, the AIS military intelligence combat section that will support Code N. Functionally, the soldiers we recruit for both will need the same abilities : toughness, ability to think on your feet, flexibility, bravery, and a will to excel. Given that Code N will tend towards direct combat and Code S towards infiltration, those of you who are scout-snipers and engineers will probably end up with Code S, while riflemen and heavy weapons soldiers with Code N, but we're not making that a hard and fast rule."

Grissom glanced at the general. "For now, General Izunami will describe how we'll be conducting the selection process. You should all be proud to have gotten this far, and even if you do not get selected for this round of training, you will be at the top of the selection list the next time we do recommendations. You are all a credit to humanity, marines."

He turned. "General."

Izunami was a tall and slender man in his late forties, with a mix of Asiatic and African features. Dark slanted black eyes gazed out from a hard face, with a wide nose, a cruel mouth, and a heavy jaw, and his hair was carefully pulled back in long thin braids trimmed to military length requirements. His voice, when he spoke, was smoky and raspy, as if he rarely talked.

"Thank you for volunteering. On the tables in front of you are three forms. The first is an acknowledgment that nothing you have learned today can be communicated to anyone not in this hall on pain of death. Nothing, marines. Any violation of this is an immediate gunshot to the head from the Commissars."

He glared, then continued. "The second is a form informing you that it is very likely you may die during the selection process. It will be an exceedingly trying evolution, and while we have made preparations and adjustments to attempt to ensure everyone's survival, it is doubtful there will be no losses. The final form is a receipt of the fact that if you are sitting here, you just got moved to your maximum time in rate and pay for your rank. For everyone under the rank of Chief, this means you now qualify for immediate promotion. This does not apply to officers, but officers will receive an extra TAB accolade on your service jacket, almost ensuring promotion during the next review cycle."

Next to Ahern, Rachel pumped her fist. Ahern sighed.

"These pay raises are in effect immediately, along with double normal hazardous duty pay. Given what we're going to be putting you through, you're going to earn it, even if you don't make it."

He paused, glancing around the room.

"This force, whether you make it through tomorrow or not, is going to be the core of the strike effort against any alien hostiles we face over the next three years. Those of you not chosen for N or S service will be reassigned training commands to stiffen and increase readiness of our marines, or will be given the honor of raising and training entirely new units from scratch."

Izunami smiled. It wasn't a pleasant looking smile. "Given that some of you are not going to live to see your promotion, I suggest celebrating tonight, as long as you keep the reasons why you got promoted to yourself. Now, we will cover the evolution that will determine selections."

"There will be, as stated earlier, four phases. The first phase is a battery of physical and psychological tests that will be administered tomorrow morning. Anyone who does not meet the standards set by our doctors will be removed. This test should take no more than twenty-five minutes per person, and we should have you all cleared by noon tomorrow. Those who fail at stage one will be tapped to provide training to current marine forces."

"Phase two will start upon completion of your testing. You will be taken, as five person teams, to the edge of the Okefenokee Bayou-Bay south of here. Your goal will be to reach one of fifty ten-person shuttles located at least sixty miles from your starting point. As you all know, the Okefenokee is one of the most lethal, radiated, and dangerous environments on Earth where life is able to survive. You will be given one primary and one secondary weapon, basic medical gear, anti-radiation and anti-toxin supplies, and five days of food and water. Each shuttle is controlled by remote VI and is code-locked. It will only take off when ten people are onboard. After the last shuttle has taken off, all remaining participants not aboard a shuttle will be evacuated and will have failed to proceed."

"Out of the five hundred teams currently present, no more than one hundred teams – five hundred of you – can proceed to the next phase. Those who fail at stage two will be chosen to lead and build an entirely new marine force to accompany the newly designated Third Fleet."

"Those aboard the shuttles will be treated and allowed two days to recover before phase three. Phase three will be a tournament style elimination contest. Combat will be by team, and will proceed until only twenty-five teams remain standing. Combat will be simulated using laser-tag style weapons and non-lethal paint grenades, in the environs of a special training area recently finished in central Brazil. Teams who succeed will press on to the final phase, those who fail at this stage will be set aside as reserves for the N and S teams, and given additional training as well as granted service with the _Solguard_."

The general folded his arms. "The final phase will be one-on-one combat demonstrations and interviews with command staff. Final designation of N or S status will be conferred at that time. Given that we only expect to commission twenty teams, the remaining twenty-five marines not chosen for N or S status will receive an automatic pass through the phases during the next selection cycle, and will be given assignments with the Guard of Iron."

At that, a quiet murmur washed across the room. Service with the _Solguard_ was a vast reward, given that the ranks of that elite force were given the best training, pay, and facilities in the military. But to be allowed to work with the Guard of Iron was even more unheard of. The ceremonial force was highly trained, but even beyond that, were the personal guard of the Lords. Even a short assignment with the Guard usually parlayed itself into extremely lucrative contracts as private security or even transfers to the X presidential protection detail.

Izunami glanced around the room, which slowly fell silent. "Many of you are asking why we are making such rewards even for failure available. That is because you are very worthy of such, and because the rewards offered will aid us in stiffening and upgrading both you and the forces you are attached to. We believe that there is every possibility that there will be deaths or injuries in training, and having a large pool of applicants to replace casualties will be useful in ensuring training can move at the proper pace."

Izunami placed his hands behind his back. "One hundred of you will become the razor's edge of the sword of the Alliance. We all pray that we are wasting our time and yours, that in the fullness of time when we come across aliens, they will be friendly,and the SA can step out of an era of ruthless suppression and into one of true democracy, peace, and prosperity once more. But if that is not the case, if the raptors do turn out to be hostile,it will be you men and women sitting here today who save us all."

Grissom spoke again. "Please fill out the papers in front of you and take the electronic pad sitting next to them, along with the digital dog tag. The tag will allow us to track you and assist in recovery during Phase Two, so don't lose it. You have the rest of the day to yourselves. Report to Carran Field on the east side of the base tomorrow at 0800 sharp in undress BDU's only. Do not bring weapons, armor, or any form of equipment – everything will be issued once the examinations and interviews are done."

He glanced around the room, mouth set in a hard line. "I would suggest you all get some rest tonight, to prepare for tomorrow. It will be an exceedingly fatiguing day."

The lights came back up to full, and Ahern blinked, before shaking his head, and turned his attention to the paperwork.

* * *

**_Author's Notes:_**

_A few details that might go unnoticed :  
_

_\- 'Prothean' is the asari translation. Until the end of the FCW, humanity called the Protheans 'Forerunners'. _

_\- The Guard of Iron were special elite units that descended from the mercenary troops that conquered Earth under Victor Manswell. Think of them as like a mix of Delta Force + Marine Ceremonial Guard + rock stars. _

_\- General Izunami is the father of the major that commands Vega in Paragon Lost. _

_\- I've had to take some liberties with maps and star positions. Based on the galaxy map in game, Sol is actually closest to Citadel Space , far closer than Shanxi. Which makes no sense (along with Tuchanka being smack in the middle of Citadel Space one jump from the Citadel, lol). _


	5. Chapter 5

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of a really good steak, and of acid-drooling slugcats_

* * *

The night before the testing began was one of mixed tension and excitement for almost all of the teams participating. While all the Marines kept in mind their need to keep the contents of the briefing quiet, they didn't have to hide the fact that they were all slated to test for Special Ops, and the majority of them hit the town, either taking the magrail to the Charleston Arcology, or the tube over to Little Jacksonville to party.

Ahern's group was no different, and they met up at the Longhorn, a pricy steakhouse that had survived all the years from the twentieth century, in Little Jacksonville. The streets were full of both civilians and soldiers, but no one paid their group too much mind, and they were able to get inside with almost no wait.

The ancient building was reinforced with fresh light brown armacrete, with the inside renovated a dozen times and ending up with a mix of light sandalwood trim and heavier oak flooring, oversized round tables and a bar almost sixty feet long. Trees and other greenery flanked the open sky dining area they ate in, which also had a leaded glass mosaic overhead to cut down on direct light. Old jazz music was played by sturdy speakers, while servers in long white coats brought out expensive and rare dishes, mostly related to the old 'surf and turf' menu of years gone by.

Given that the Longhorn had one of the few licenses in the world to serve actual cattle, medically certified seafood, and honest to God pork instead of reconstructed soybean paste with protein supplements, the price for the food was staggering – Ahern's 16 oz prime rib cost over $200, and even Kyle, who ate lightly, came in at $110.

As he dug into his meal, though, the price didn't seem to matter to Ahern much. The steak was exquisite, and the rest of the food just as good. He'd never had a real steak in his life. Quite possibly nobody in his entire family had ever eaten a steak this good in the past fucking century. If he was possibly going to die in some godforsaken, radioactive swamp he wanted to have one damned good meal before checking out.

That, and some fun with Sheila Adkins in the pool ... later on tonight.

The group talked about minor things at first – catching up with a few acquaintances they saw in the meetings, the usual back-and-forth bickering between Chu and Saracino over politics, Rachel's ongoing attempts to get Kyle to date one of the countless legions of girls nearly throwing themselves at him, Kyle's ongoing attempts to get Rachel not to act like a floozy, and Ahern trying to teach Kyle how to curse like a real man – but conversation stopped when their food came. Once it slowly started back up again after the first moans of delight at the wonderful tastes, discussion quickly turned from bullshit to the near future.

Ahern was the leader of the team – even Rachel deferred to him. So made sure that while he turned the conversation to his plans to get through the trials ahead, he also encouraged them to give their feedback on his ideas. He considered himself a fair judge of tactics, and mindful of the need to balance offense and defense, but he always included the others in his tactical planning, both to make them feel like they had a part of the plan, and to honestly gain perspective from their insights.

Such meetings usually started off well and then almost always descended into a contest of insults, but Ahern could live with that. Smirking as he focused on the large and clunky flatscreen tablet with his musings about the coming fights on it, he tapped it with his free hand.

Everyone glanced at him, and he paused to swallow a bite of loaded mashed potatoes before speaking.

"We should be in a pretty good situation. Rachel and I can fuck up any other rifleman in the marines; Saracino is the goddamned Grim Reaper, and Chu and Kyle can more than fucking hold their own. Once we make it past this Ok-you-fucked-me swamp bullshit, all we have to do is show everyone why we were chosen for the _Solguard _right out of first rotation."

He sighed. "The problem isn't the second or third phases; it's the first – the swamp. Never mind that with our fucking luck, we'll get jumped by ABC War Robots, fucking deathjaws, or mutated snakes the size of a bus. The bigger mess is that we're going into something that, for once, we are not likely to be the best experts in handling. None of us have ever operated in swamp environments, but common sense tells us some things to consider."

Saracino piped up. "Swamps are _smelly_! We'll need to bring air freshener."

Ahern gave him a glance. "Your attempts at humor remain pure shitfuckery, Mike." Grunting, he continued. "A swamp will cut down on our mobility. It doesn't allow silent movement. It limits line of sight. Worst of all, it gives us no real area to setup for cover."

He gave a small nod as the expression on his friend's faces changed. Team Smashfucker, as Saracino colorfully referred to them as, had developed a fearsome reputation for speed, accuracy, the clever use of cover and evasion, stealth and deceptive tactics. Most of this relied on the fact that the entire time was fast on their feet with excellent reflexes, and the unbelievable speed and accuracy of Saracino's sniper rifle and Kyle and Rachel with assault rifles. Chu's brilliance with small unmanned drone vehicles was only matched by his ability with traps, and Ahern sometimes felt like the weak link.

A swamp, though – that fucked with literally everything they were good at. He let it finish sinking in before speaking.

"I've been racking my brains all day to figure out how we are going to pull this off, and nothing I have makes much sense. Our strongest forte is in full-fire ambush scenarios, which we won't have. Combined with the fact that it's a goddamned swamp with all the problems I just mentioned, most of our usual formations are worthless."

Rachel was eating tank-grown shrimp, probably from some sea-farm arcology in the Northwest. As she popped one in her mouth, she turned the pad to her, and once she finished chewing, spoke. "Our best bet is still to rely on what we're good at. We're going to be fast and mobile. The goal is to find a shuttle and get there in one piece. Since I doubt they'll give us a fucking map, we've got only one real choice – follow a rapid search pattern and try to find a shuttle, and then figure out how to attract a second team to the location and split."

Kyle sighed. "What kind of search pattern? Standard sweep and clear? I'm fairly sure none of us has ever negotiated a swamp before, and we don't know what patterns will work or will get us going in circles. While we are all skilled, we are usually deployed en masse with clear orders. None of us has any sort of recon or tracking skills. Nor are we familiar with any methods of finding our bearings in a gigantic swamp which, based on the timing, will be in nightfall less than five hours after we arrive."

Saracino frowned, actually getting serious. "Fuck. Low light cuts down on the range we can pick up incoming threats. And given the place is the worst shithole on the continent, you can bet all kinds of fun things will come to chew on our nuts once nightfall hits. I doubt we'll get NV gear, either. Still, we can just dig in once it gets dark, right? It's not like a goddamned gator is going to sneak up on us if we just set traps."

Kyle chimed in. "There are slugs roughly the size of a cat that like to drop from trees and have an acidic sucker-mouth to liquefy and suck up their prey. I believe there are also six different varieties of carnivorous swarming insects, and the mosquitoes carry Type B-II hemorrhagic fever along with an enzyme that inhibits clotting."

Saracino gave him a long look before shaking his head. "Man, I didn't need to fucking hear that. Thank you for tonight's nightmares, bastard." He chewed at a piece of sliced pork, glancing at Chu. "What about traps? We can do traps at night, right?"

Chu sighed. "They will be useful when we stop for the night, yes. And possibly in defending a shuttle until another team shows up…but on the move there is little I can do aside from claymores behind us, and those are as likely to maim other marines as they are to stop wildlife." Chu folded his arms. "I suspect many of our problems, both in finding a shuttle and evading the more dangerous parts of the swamp, could be solved by linking up with a good recon-focused team, save that I don't know how to identify any of them."

Saracino bit into his roll, mumbling around his food. "Shit, that's easy. We send the Boy Scout to chat up some other teams, then link up with 'em once we start." He jerked his head towards Kyle, who was eating in decorum.

Ahern sighed. "That won't solve all our issues. The problem with a pure recon team – which is usually two scouts, one heavy, and a pair of CQB's- is they're going to be eaten goddamned alive in that shithole of a swamp, Mike. There's mutated fucking alligators, eezo-dusted crocs that can supposedly bite through steel, fucked up swarms of piranha with a paralytic bite, and according to Kyle, apparently giant slugcats."

He cut some more steak, grunting. "What we need is a damned good recon team – like a non pansy-ass scouty version of us, basically. That would solve both our problems."

Yonis Chu frowned. "Those are not the only problems we face, Tradius" He lowered his voice. "Hasn't anyone asked why they'd stage this kind of exam in such a horrid place? They go on about how valuable we all are, yet dozens of us are likely to get killed in this phase, when the next two phases are perfectly safe. It doesn't add up…"

Ahern sighed, while Saracino muttered. "Let me guess – there's a secret Knight Templar base there they want plundered. Or wait, Elvis was sighted." He stuffed more food in his mouth, rolling his eyes. "All aboard the bullshit conspiracy train with your esteemed, noble conductor, the honorable Lord Chu-Chu."

Florez giggled, and then mocked a train whistle sound. Ahern shot her a dirty look and she gave an impish grin.

Chu shook his head. "Now that the idiot duo has spoken their piece…here's what I know, based on what I was able to ask my father last night. The Eastern American Group for Liberty was based out of the ruins of Tallahassee, which is just west of and quite near to the Okefenokee. The Commissars never did clean them completely out, because they've built bases and hideouts in the swamp, and they've been a thorn in the side of the SE District for a while."

He looked around at each of them. "My father said the original plan for this event, from what he gathered, was only a tournament style face off, and this was added in the last week. I think this entire first phase is a chance to kill two birds with one stone – test us in horrible survival conditions and flush out any remaining EAGL terrorists. People who go in just expecting wildlife are going to be unprepared for actual combat with human beings."

Kyle frowned. "Groups with heavy firepower and combat focus will be less effective at scouting and locating the shuttles, but more successful in fighting off the wildlife and any possible terrorist action. Recon teams might be more able to find the shuttles quickly, but are poorly equipped to deal with heavy fighting. And hybrid teams are likely to fail at both. A rather clever ploy, if you look at what you would want in your Special Forces units. Only the most skilled, flexible and capable will make it through."

Rachel drank her wine thoughtfully. "Yay, we've proven once again the SA is lead by heartless REMF's who live to get us line animals killed. Shocking. Any ideas on how we, you know, avoid being _eaten_ or otherwise dismembered while finding a shuttle?"

Ahern nodded, and then frowned, tapping his tablet to show a map of the Okefenokee Bayou-Bay. "Just one. The main sections of dry land are to the far south and east of the swamp, with a big chunk near the northwest– there's the ruins of an old university there. If there's a shuttle anywhere in this fucking mess, this Valdosta College is the only place likely to have any standing structures and places to tuck it out of sight."

Kyle nodded. "It's also a likely strongpoint for any EAGL terrorists, should Chu's suspicions be correct."

He waved a hand. "I'm not worried about them. I can't even count how many of those stupid 'Don't Tread On Me' idiots we've killed in the past year. Fire discipline is something they think you do with BBQ, and their idea of tactics is remembering to take the fucking safety off before charging in with Rambo-style bullshit. If anything I'm a lot more worried about running into old ABC robots or the wildlife than those clowns."

Kyle summed up. "So. We must attempt to locate a superior recon team, preferably tonight or before the actual testing tomorrow. We would prefer to be able to rapidly proceed overland through whatever open clearings that can be located to maximize our effectiveness, stopping to trap a perimeter and dig in at night. The ruins of Valdosta College is our primary target, given we don't know the swamp well and are unlikely to find a guide."

Ahern nodded. "Position breakdown." Kyle was like a tactical machine, sometimes, and Ahern liked the way the big man could put together the proper way to approach any situation.

Kyle finished his asparagus. "Given our skill sets and the travails of our itinerary, Saracino should act as mobile sniper, focusing on taking out distant threats and crippling incoming forces. Chu should split his duties between scouting with any drones is allowed to operate when we are stationary, and as Mike's spotter when on the move, covering our rear arc. Rachel and I will act as primary riflemen, covering the front and side oblique arcs, while Ahern should take up the position of both point man and close-in rapid defense, given his toughness and reaction time. Assuming we meet a standard recon team, their heavy should backstop Saracino, with CQB in the front and rear and scouts to the sides, assisting in both spotting and cover fire."

Saracino sighed. "That never fails to be a little creepy, Boy Scout. You sound like a damned tactical VI."

Kyle shrugged, and Ahern snorted. "Now, finding a good recon team. Off the top of your head, does anyone at all know of any good recon types?"

Rachel and Saracino looked at him blankly, Saracino speaking first. "I know lots by name and rep, but none of them personally, and you can fucking bet the dispatch guy is not going to just give out that kind of information. Plus, we have no 'in' with these people to get them to listen."

Rachel nodded. "He's right, as usual. Even if we did know a good team directly, how would be find them? I mean, I know that the Fourth Scout-Sniper of PriBeta is probably some of the best recon specialists in the SA but there's no way to know which units are participating or not without just wandering around and asking, which would take days."

Kyle frowned, but Chu rubbed his chin. "I can think of one recon person that we should be able to find pretty quick, based on her appearance, assuming she's gotten this far and didn't wash out in the paperwork crunch."

He finished his last bits of food before continuing. "Jon Grissom was talking to my father and my grandfather at the last meeting of the High Lords, and was a little amused at Dad playing up my accomplishments so much. I remember Grissom saying his own daughter was in some kind of recon specialist group, and that they just got commendations and promotions for tracking and taking out a pirate band near Thanas. He said she was surprisingly sneaky and hard to spot, especially given her coloring was like his own."

Saracino snorted. "Pale white skin, blond hair and blue eyes? Yeah, that is pretty damned rare these days, so she should stand out like a sore thumb. We could split up and just look through the crowds of marines as they come in from leave later tonight…"

Something about that description was bothering him, even as Rachel was skeptically questioning the plan. "Why would they help us?"

Chu smiled. "Because if one of them is really Grissom's daughter, EAGL will be trying to kill her, given that Grissom's assault drove them into the swamp and shattered their organization. All we need to do is reveal they are likely to be in the swamp, and they'll want all the extra backup they can get."

Rachel grunted. "Pretty slick thinking, Chu Chu. Maybe that conspiracy shit is worth something after all. She pushed her hair back behind her ears, and the motion clicked with Ahern, making him shake his head.

"Now I remember. I saw a person like that yesterday, on the team sitting next to us. Chatted with one of the LTs a bit. Fuck, what was his name!?"

Kyle piped up. "I believe it was Lieutenant David Anderson, Second Marine, Thanas."

Saracino rolled his eyes. "Do you memorize fucking everything?"

Kyle shrugged. "It's called a photographic memory, Michael. It isn't like I can help it."

Saracino stared at him for several seconds, and then shook his head. "I don't know if it's awesome that every time you fuck a chick you basically have a porn recording afterward, or fucked up because you'll never forget the time you walked in on Rachel in the shower during her period and fainted."

Ahern, Chu, and Florez all facepalmed, while Kyle grimaced. "Thank you for bringing that back to the forefront of my mind."

Saracino airly waved a fork of food around. "That's my job. Professional asshole. I'm surrounded by incompetent idiots, I can't help letting them know the truth every now and then."

Chu snorted. "Aside from killing people with your sniper rifle, you can't do anything, Mike."

"Or a pistol. Or rifle. Or pretty much anything that shoots, throws, or fires. And honestly, it's not my fault I'm this way. I was a perfectly adjusted and nice person until I started working with you all. Fucking weirdoes. Rachel excluded."

Ahern coughed. "Someone find a fucking kettle, pot is calling." Chu snickered at this, while Saracino only raised an eyebrow.

"You want some of this, Ahernia?"

Ahern rolled his eyes. "Mike, that was a pretty weak comeback. You don't know who you want to insult more, Chu or Kyle or me, and you just bounce around between insulting us all like a guy using a trampoline."

Saracino ate his bite of food and swallowed. "I know exactly who I want to insult. As for trampolines… I also know they used to call them jumpolines. Until your mom used one the first time."

Chu sighed even as Ahern blinked; thought for a minute, then went red and lunged over the table.

**X – LiBaS – X**

After dinner, Ahern walked across the various barracks squares near the main assembly point, doing searches on his cellphone. He finally managed to find the number for the transfer and information officer for off-world TDY units, and called them to find David Anderson's location. As expected, the TDY dispatcher didn't want to give out the information, but dropping a lie saying that he knew him from Thanas and just wanted to talk to 'the old man's daughter' got past the man's suspicion.

As it happened, the TDY dispatcher sent him towards the other nice restaurant in Little Jacksonville, the Broken Keg. He staked out the front of the building, waiting, and about ten minutes after he had arrived there was a commotion at the door of the restaurant. A group of five marines came out, wearing plain undress BDU's with no rank markings and simple nametag, two of them arguing over something while the third cursed at them both.

The leader of the group was clearly the biggest of the Lieutenants, with RICHARDS printed on his barrel chest. His head was shaven bald and the guy was even bigger than Kyle. Next to him, the other two black guys – ANDERSON and PELLHAM – were still big and muscular, but not quite so heavyset. Anderson had a certain refined look to him, while Pelham was still cursing loudly – and well, in Ahern's opinion.

Bringing up the rear and talking softly were the girl with the blond hair and bright blue eyes, with SANDERS printed on her shirt, and a slender but muscular Chinese man with slightly out of regs hair and LENG for a nametag. Strangely enough, Ahern caught the outlines of at least three knives under the man's BDU's.

Ahern pushed off the corner of the building he'd been leaning against and boldly walked up to the group. "Pardon me. You Sierra Recon of Second Thanas?"

The reaction was obvious. The Chinese fellow placed both hands into a martial arts posture, moving the girl behind him in a clearly protective fashion, while the two smaller black guys fell back a bit to flank her. The big man up front seemed to actually get bigger as he folded massive arms over his chest, his voice sounding akin to a pissed off avalanche or an out-of-sorts meteor strike.

"What concern is that of yours?"

Ahern smiled. "Because my team is participating in the event tomorrow … and we are good fighters, but not so good at reconnaissance."

The black guy on the right scowled. "Motherfucker, do we look like we can't kick ass on our own? Do you not see how goddamned big Tiny is?"

Ahern could not help but arch an eyebrow, turning to look at Richards with a disbelieving note in his voice. "Your fucking nickname is Tiny?"

Anderson spoke, a long-suffering note in his voice. "He is the runt of the family, he claims. Look, Captain – I think we met yesterday – we appreciate the concern, but we can take care of ourselves."

Ahern folded his arms. "Sure you can. I've got news for you guys, though – this swamp we're headed to? One of my teammates is in Family Chu. He heard the place is a fallback point for a bunch of separatists called EAGL." He gestured at the blond girl. "If I know whose daughter she is, you can fucking bet they will. And given the shit in that swamp, your size is just going to get you shot faster."

The big lieutenant glanced back at Sanders, who sighed. Her voice was clear and sweet, if soft. "My father hates EAGL because they killed my sister…it's likely the whole reason we're going into the swamp is so he can use this exercise to kill the last of them off."

The man named Pellham groaned. "And the big man didn't think to fucking tell _us_ this shit? Jesus fuck. We ATE with the stupid bastard last fucking night."

Sanders glared. "He's not stupid!"

Pellham snorted. "Shiit. Girl, in my book if you send your kid into a damned swamp and forget to fucking mention it's full of people who wanna god-stomp the shit outta you? That's stupid."

Ahern leaned back against the wall, crossing his feet at the ankles and grinning. "Did I mention my group is all _Solguard _vets, and we have Michael Saracino as our sniper? We just can't really operate in a swamp that we have no idea on how to navigate. We'd be happy to help you guys out."

The Chinese man spoke, his voice calm and whispery, but cool. "What do you suggest, Captain Ahern? And yes, I know who you are – as well as your ally Yonis Chu."

Ahern's eyes narrowed. This one looked like a snake. "Deal is simple. We team up at the outset, you help us navigate through and find a shuttle, and we keep you safe and help you fight off anything that fucks with us. We need ten people to take off anyway, and it's unlikely my combat heavy team and your recon heavy team will be going for the same slots anyway."

Richards frowned. "We were planning to roll with the Fourth Thanas."

Leng shook his head. "They are weak. This group would serve better in keeping Kahlee safe." He placed a hand on her shoulder, and she smiled at him. Anderson gave the Chinese man an upset look, and Ahern wondered what that was about.

_If this is some kind of love triangle bullshit, I'm going to lose it completely. _

The man named Pellham looked him over. "Assuming we roll with this shit…you got a plan? We're familiar with swamps from Thanas, and where the shuttles will be is pretty obvious, but we have no way of knowing shit we'll be running up against, and two of us are CQB types."

Ahern brought out his tablet, flicking it on to show the neatly diagrammed plans of Preston Kyle on the eight inch screen, accounting for two CQB troops and two scouts along with one heavy working with his own team. "I'm guessing 'Tiny' here is the heavy?"

The big man sighed, and then shook his head. "It's your call, Sanders."

The woman gave Ahern a careful, measuring look, before glancing back to the Chinese man, who slowly nodded. "Let's at least try it out."

Ahern smirked. "I'll send you my TTL code. I'm headed over to Sam's Last Stand; I can have the team meet you there in thirty to discuss this some more."

Pellham gave a crow of laughter. "I love that place!"

Anderson merely shook his head. "That isn't really the sort of place for Kahlee to be seen…."

Ahern arched his eyebrow. "I made Yonis Chu drink a beer in there. If it's good enough for the grandon of a High Lord of Sol…."

Anderson snorted, as Pell nodded. "We'll meet you there in an hour." With that, they swept on down the street, being careful to keep Sanders roughly in the middle of their group at all times.

Ahern was struck by the thought that they looked less like a coherent team and more like a bodyguard unit, then dismissed it. No need to give Chu more conspiracy theory material to work with, after all.

* * *

**_Author's Notes:_**

_As usual, the AN's will cover subtle details that might go unnoticed :  
_

_\- In case you aren't up on your reading in my Cerberus Files, Pellham is Theo Pellham - better known at Pel some thirty years later_

_\- Yes, that is Kai Leng. It's an AU. _

_\- Yes, I had Kahlee Sanders messing with Kai Leng. She knew Anderson was attracted to her, and she was a little to him, but more to Kai. When Kai turned out to be a dick, she ended up chasing and being shot down by Anderson for twenty years. He was ... pretty bitter. _

_\- The Broken Keg and the Longhorn are actual (and completely fucking awesome) restaurants near Camp Lejune in Jacksonville. _

_\- Likewise, the Okefenoke is a real swamp, not far from where I was stationed in Georgia. And it is full of crocs, and mosquitoes we call flying teeth that will raise a good sized welt on your arm if they bite you. _

_\- a 'claymore' is a stationary mine, usually set low and to one side, that explodes latterally, usually throwing shrapnel into legs and crippling it's victims. _

_\- CQB = Close quarters battle, i.e, melee weapons or unarmed combat. _


	6. Chapter 6

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of crash-landings, and how snipers are like chocolate and shoes._

* * *

As it turned out, the physical and psychological tests went pretty quickly for everyone involved. Most of them were fairly simplistic – blood work-ups, pathogen checks, a long checklist of various allergens and the like. A basic physical exam and a battery of simple psychological questions that left Ahern slightly puzzled finished the activity out.

He did note that both Commissars and several guys in gray suits were observing everything, but that didn't surprise him. The SA had never bothered with a Special Forces division before – most spec-ops were handled by elements of the Guard of Iron. The concentration of firepower and trained killers in the hands of apolitical generals is how whackaloons like Ardiente got started, and keeping an eye on things was to be expected.

By noon, the tests were done and the marines cycled out of the area and further afield, ending up with Ahern and his team standing near the main landing field of Camp Lejune, alongside the rest of the many assembled teams. Seemingly endless rows of shuttles lined the battered tarmac, each painted in white and blue. The shuttles were a recent innovation, using the mass-effect technology that had overhauled so much modern technology in recent years. Each shuttle had twice the efficiency and speed of the old MR-4 VTOL gunships, without sacrificing armor.

Teams shuffled around in nervous agitation, wearing little else than BDU uniforms, while eight huge cargo pods hulked off to one side, along with a large number of loader-mechs.

With all the marines, it took Ahern's team almost ten minutes to hook up with Lieutenant Pellham and his team. Most of that was just finding them in the crowd of marine teams, which were slowly shifting around much in the same way Ahern's team was. He finally found Pellham, waving and leading his own team over.

Ahern knew Pellham wasn't in charge of the other team, but as he was the only one of the five who cussed like a man, Ahern mostly talked to him. Anderson was related to the noble Anderson family, close enough to have his nose in the air, but not close enough to be actual nobility. Kai Leng apparently couldn't speak louder than a fucking whisper, and the giant Richards just did whatever Pel or Sanders told him to. As for Sanders, she acted like her shit didn't stink, which always pissed him off.

His suspicions had been right. This unit was little more than a glorified bodyguard for Grissom's daughter, who had used her mother's maiden name to avoid being hounded by those seeking access to Grissom's fame. And as he figured, there was some kind of bullshit going on between the girl and the Chinese guy, and tensions between Leng and Anderson.

After the meeting at Sam's Last Stand, he'd been careful to catch Pellham after everyone went their own way, and had stopped the bigger man to ask him about it. Pellham, who had given a shattering bellow of laughter at the question, had him go back into the bar for a beer and explained.

"Oh, that shit? Goddamned comedy gold. When she was a bit younger, Kahlee and Anderson were close, I guess. His family was some kinda one-off from the real nobles, enough to get them in with the Grissoms. The two of them ended up having a bit of a thing – can't fault the man's taste."

Ahern rolled his eyes. "Was this after they enlisted?"

Pellham had grinned and continued. "Nope. Anderson broke it off when they entered the military as it wouldn't be 'proper'. That hurt Kahlee, who I guess felt isolated enough already, and she ended up fooling around with Pretty Ninja Boy later on, which pissed Anderson off a lot. Course, nobody told Old Man Grissom, so when he pulled strings to get Kahlee put in a safe team, he paired her up with Anderson, and Kai Leng barely got on the team at all. And now Kai likes putting the dick to her just to drive Anderson crazy."

Ahern had stared at the man, aghast. "Are they fucking _crazy_? Does no one fucking understand why it is a bad idea to bang your goddamned teammates? Especially in a situation like that?"

Pellham had shrugged. "You're preaching to the choir, brother. To the fucking choir."

Ahern had decided then and there that these people – with the possible exception of Pellham – were idiots and best used as bullet stoppers. He hooked up with his team in their barracks that night, and both Kyle and Chu found it extremely stupid and likely to get someone killed. Rachel found the entire thing funny when Ahern related it to her and Saracino.

"Awk, how sweet." She snorted. "I know you hate the idea what Mike and I get up to, but have we ever endangered the unit?"

Ahern folded his arms. "No. I don't like it, but there's been more than one situation where one of you has been hurt and the other one didn't bat an eyelash, mostly because you two are ice-cold psychopaths."

Rachel rolled her eyes. "No, we're not. I love Mike the same way I love chocolate, new shoes and old rock music – makes me feel good, but I can live without it. I have to be realistic about the kind of guys interested in me, but that doesn't give me an excuse to act like a fool."

She pushed her hair out of her pretty features. "That isn't the case with that bullshit Sanders is pulling, though. It sounds like she hasn't quite figured out that this is the real deal, and if she's really just sleeping with the guy to get back at this Anderson person for being dumped…Christ."

Ahern nodded grimly. "Worse than that, according to Pellham, Leng and Anderson are pretty hostile to each other over it. That's a problem in the field, and never goddamned acceptable."

Rachel had sobered at that. "No, it isn't, but then again, most men think with their dicks. It's one thing to enjoy a good roll. It's another to drag emotional baggage into a live-fire situation. I think we should be pretty careful in what we say and do around them – if you are right, they could be unpredictable if that bitch buys it." She laughed. "That shouldn't be hard, considering you guys are some of the most uptight, grimly silent assholes I've ever known when it's time to go to war."

The rest of Team Smashfucker had agreed on that, and now, waiting for the event to start, Ahern realized the other team was making small talk among themselves, as opposed to the professional silence of his own team. It struck him that the others looked relaxed and excited, and his own team looked...

Like they were waiting to kill. Maybe Rachel had a point about being too uptight, but she was as bad as the rest of them when it came to taking care of business. And in any case – this _was_ the goddamned military. They were about to go traipsing around in a radioactive, god-forsaken swamp full of terrorists, old war robots and mutant animals, not to mention horrible diseases. It wasn't really a time for levity, in his opinion.

Just as Ahern was about to say something to Chu, and maybe spend the time setting up insertion approaches, Admiral Grissom appeared, flanked to his left by the High General of the SA, Lord General Alfred von Grath, and on the right by a hard looking man with the physique of a serious iron-pumper. Grissom glanced around the field, a tight and satisfied smile on his face.

"It's good to see you are all fired up, Marines. As I said, the first part of this test is to weed out everyone but the very best. The swamp you are headed to is, I reiterate, lethal. There are more challenges than the terrain, the area is overrun with both hostile wildlife and malfunctioning ABC war robots that failed at clean up. The radiation level is kappa, which is just enough to make you grow an arm from your head if you stay in it long enough. There may also be chemical or biotoxic hazards from abandoned cities and at least one downed transport that probably scattered eezo everywhere."

He paused. "There is also the possibility of encountering terrorist units, sovereign citizen types, or the like, but such will be both irradiated and probably badly armed, making them little threat. If they surrender you can send up a RED flare for a shuttle to pick them up for Commissariat processing – otherwise your orders include a lethal force authorization."

He gestured to the cargo pods. "As you were told to arrive with no gear – except those of you who are melee specialists – we have provided. All of you will be issued the following: a field pack with four days of rations, a water purification kit, a first aid kit, and six bottles of purified water with built-in contaminant filters. You will also have some replacement air filters, some water purification tabs and anti-rad drugs in the kit, but be advised you will require a rad-clense once you come out. We're aware some of you might be rad-intolerant…and we can't afford that in the SpecFor, so this will filter you out."

"You will also be issued one set of Class A Striker Combat Armor, one Armstrong pistol, and one weapon of choice: either a Lancer assault rifle, an H&amp;K800 shotgun, or a Kadar sniper rifle. If you decide to forgo a weapon aside from the pistol you can choose another piece of gear from whatever you see, such as additional rations, a barrier tent, a MK V unarmed scouting drone, or additional medical supplies."

"Melee CQB types were instructed to bring your own weapons, but if you don't have it or would prefer to keep them away from a radioactive swamp, you will be offered a standard shock-baton or a set of combat blades."

He glanced around. "As for one-off equipment, those of you who are medics will have a full medical kit. Engineers will be given two Model VII armed aerial drones and a trap kit. Scouts will be given FLIR/UV binocs and a GPS mapping uplink. Heavy weapons specialists will be issued a mass-effect lightened GM-GE 1707 minigun or a Kadar-Glock magnetic-recoilless rifle with gyrojet hi-explosive or armor shredder rounds."

The crowd murmured, and Ahern winced. The weapons weren't too bad – the Armstrong was a pretty good pistol, actually – but the armor was complete garbage, heavy and not designed for fast movers or recon types. It was one of the only environmentally sealed armors capable of holding up to rad-unsafe conditions, though, which is no doubt why they chose it. The support line up was pretty crappy – the binocs and GPS gear would be spotty in usefulness, and the medical supplies were useless without a clean area to de-armor and apply them with.

The drones – both the unarmed and armed kind – would be a plus. And since Saracino usually used a Kadar sniper rifle anyway, that was also good. He refocused his attention on the man next to Grissom.

"My name is Master Warrant Officer Jeremy John Boyle. I have already done everything you people are about to do, including fucking around in a godforsaken swamp and fought several ranking Guard of Iron types to prove my abilities. I will be your lead training coordinator. Many of you are officers. I do not give a shit, as a Warrant Officer outranks everyone except Victor Manswell and Jesus Christ, and neither of them is here."

He smiled coldly. "I can and will put you on the ground or in a hospital bed if you give me shit. Am I clear, Marines?"

"Sir, yes sir!" The thunder of the reply was instantaneous. No one was stupid enough to mess with a warrant officer wearing the intricate ribbon-belt that signaled he had been awarded the Iron Valor, the highest personal award the Manswell family could bestow. While not as openly prestigious as the Star of Terra, in some ways it was more impressive – the man had been giving a token saying the Manswell family owed him whatever he liked.

"Good. Since I have my doubt that you apes can follow orders correctly, I will be guiding you through this process so that at least some of you morons get out of this alive. The first stage of what you are going to be doing is very simple. There are, as you can clearly see, many shuttles at the edge of this landing field. Each shuttle can hold two-five man teams. Two teams will get on the shuttles which will scatter you over the eastern edge of the swamp."

"Those of you with brains have no doubt ascertained what teams bet fit with your own and are already teamed up. Those of you who are not get the luck of the draw. You will be dropped off at the eastern edge, as I said. You will make your way overland until you find one of the shuttles, or until ninety-six hours has passed. At that point shuttles will begin picking up remaining squads."

Warrant Officer Boyle folded his arms. "Anyone making it to a shuttle with ten people before the ninety-six hour point passes. Those who fail to do so also fail to advance. You will be given flares. If at any time your team has a medical emergency and cannot continue, send up a BLUE flare."

He gave them all a hard look.

"Sending up a BLUE flare means you are out, no arguments. Try again next time. You will note, along with your blue and red flares, you also have a single YELLOW flare. If, for some reason, the shuttle will not start, is damaged by hostiles, or some other intolerable bullshit, you may light that. A team will arrive and assess your condition – if you're at a shuttle with ten people, you will pass. If you are not, you will fail. If at any point you decide this shit is not worth it, please use the yellow rather than the blue flare."

He unfolded his arms. "I shouldn't have to say this straight out, but you all are Marines and only about half as smart as a bag of muddy rocks, so listen up close. The point of the exercise is to survive a situation that is hostile, unfamiliar, and dangerous. Some of you will die out here. It's hardly fair to your comrades to punish them for you being a coward, so if you want out, now is the time – we can reorganize teams to fill in any gaps."

He waited several long seconds, and then nodded. "Good. Stupid, but brave. Just what the SA likes. You have your orders, fall out, kit up, and move to a shuttle. God and Victor help you all."

With that, marines began to move, picking over the equipment sets. Lines were quickly setup, and each marine picked up a supply pack, a weapon of choice, and any other gear they needed. Ahern decided that since he was likely going to be the point man to take the shotgun. Chu only took a pistol – he needed a free hand for drone control anyway, and picked up a third drone by doing so – and Saracino a sniper rifle, which he immediately started sighting in on.

Kyle, Pellham, Anderson, and Florez all took rifles. Leng took a shotgun. Sanders also only took a pistol, choosing to pick up a barrier tent, while Richards effortlessly lifted the huge GM-GE 1707 minigun and associated ammo pack.

Ahern made the point of personally checking everyone's gear. "Alright, let's keep one thing clear. We are in this to win this, not to be some half-ass middle-of-the-pack lightweights. That means everyone has to pull their fucking weight." He sent a hard glare at Sanders, who gave a shrug. "I know you're close combat, but a pistol won't help much against a war robot."

"That's not a problem for me. I went with the pistol to pick up a barrier tent, so in case we need medical care we at least have a clean area to use the things. As for war robots…I figure none of the weapons that I'm only half trained in would be useful anyway." Her voice had a lilt of challenge to it, and he didn't miss the dark looks both Leng and Anderson shot him.

He snorted. "Then get your goddamned boyfriends heads in the game." He turned to the rest of them. "Stick to the fucking plan." He gestured with the shotgun towards an open shuttle, and the group piled in, stiffly sitting in the narrow, hard benches inside the craft.

A few minutes later, the doors outside shut, sealing away the sunlight that filtered through the Arcology dome. A droning voice spoke across the internal speakers. "Alert. Shuttle departing. Recommend all personnel seal environmentally at this time. Leaving sterile airspace."

Ahern banged the top of his helmet in the universal 'button up' motion, and everyone began sealing their armor. Traveling outside the Arcology into the irradiated areas outside was always nerve-wracking, but most of the planet wasn't too bad. Sixty years of work by ABC robots, nanotech paste, and hauling away contaminated dirt had reclaimed vast tracts of land. Powerful atmospheric processors and hydroactive processors constantly worked on the air and oceans.

While survival outside was by no means pleasant, it was at least possible. Even so, standard marine policy was never to expose yourself to the elements.

The shuttle trip passed slowly, each person lost in their own thoughts. Kyle fieldstripped his rifle, slowly piecing it back together. Chu tinkered with and programmed the drones, occasionally fiddling with something using a toolkit he'd tucked into his suit. Pellham dozed, Richards read from a tiny Bible, and Saracino made endless tiny adjustments to his sniper scope.

Leng and Sanders were talking softly, voices pitched low enough that their words were just smears of sound to Ahern's ears, while Anderson was talking with Rachel in a calm voice about possible tactical approaches, combining scouting paths with Rachel's ideas about advancing. Ahern shrugged mentally at it all and, deciding Pellham had the right idea, closed his eyes to wait for it to be over.

He'd just gotten to sleep when the VI chimed a blaring alert, and explosions and flames rocked the shuttle. He barely had time to brace himself before there was an ugly flash of white-red and a burst of stars in his vision, and he knew nothing else.


	7. Chapter 7

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of EMP bursts, and lovely marches in the swamp_

* * *

Ahern groaned as he came back to consciousness. He could smell smoke and something nasty and almost decaying, which immediately told him his suit seal was broken. His arm hurt, and he tasted blood in his mouth. He cautiously moved his limbs, feeling pain from his right thigh and some soreness in his neck and back.

He sat up straighter in his seat, noting the inside of the shuttle was almost completely dark, save for a single shaft of very weak sunlight coming in from a porthole. He reached for a flare on his belt and lit it off, grimacing.

A small fragment of metal had pierced his thigh armor, a slow drip of blood running down it to pool near his ankle. Equipment was flung about everywhere, and one of the drones lay crumpled near the front of the craft. The cockpit area door was askew, and through it he could see gleaming control lights faintly flickering in the darkness.

The rest of the team was in their seats, the straps had held during the crash. But several of them sported minor wounds, and an ugly dent on the shuttle hull near Kyle's head indicated he'd smashed his helmet against it pretty hard.

Even as Ahern looked around, Richards began to stir, groaning in pain. A moment later the big man grunted. "Anybody alive?"

Ahern nodded faintly. "I am, damn all the fucking luck. I think everyone else is still knocked the fuck out."

With another groan, Richards' massive hand wrapped around the harness holding him in place, since it wouldn't unbuckle, and literally tore it free of its moorings. "Goddamned piece of shit."

Ahern unhooked himself, stumbling unsteadily to his feet. The shuttle was inclined at a shallow angle. "Maybe, but it probably saved your life, you know. See if you can't get the rest of them awake while I check the piloting VI."

Richards nodded, and Ahern turned and stumbled to the front, wincing at the pain in his thigh. With a heave, he muscled past the hatch into the piloting area. "Computer?"

With no response, Ahern cursed, pulling a second flare from his belt to illuminate the darkened area. The windshield was mostly submerged, half in thick murky black mud and half in absolutely filthy water, a thin line of visible light above that. A heavy crack radiated from one corner of the shuttle, small droplets of water seeping in.

It took him a few minutes to find and trigger the emergency power switch and for a weak light to kick on, along with minimal lights on the control console. A quick status check confirmed his worse fears – the shuttle was shot. Power generation was offline, the VI was simply gone – no idea why – and the mass core was shut down. He glanced over the panel and finally found the radio, which he triggered.

"Any receiving, this is SA combined patrol downed in shuttle 534-A. Any receiving, over?"

A burst of static before a strong voice came on the line. "Shuttle 534-A, this is Alliance Airspace command. Transponder shows your shuttle grounded short of target area, what is your medical and combat status, over?"

Ahern glanced out the front windows. In the narrow band of space not submerged under water, he could see a sludgy swamp spreading in all directions, surmounted by a rotting tree line and ugly thick clouds promising rain or worse.

"No hostiles in visible range, Airspace. Be advised we are partially submerged, visibility is near nil. Radar systems non functional, VI is down. Still determining medical status."

He ducked back from the radio into the passenger area, where Richards had gotten most of them stirring. "Anybody fucking dead?"

Chu had taken off his own helmet and was in the process of removing some of Leng's leg armor. "No, but we have some broken bones, lacerations, and other issues." He pulled the piece of reinforced armor away from Leng's thigh, revealing a massive bruise and a shallow pressure cut, and sighed. "This was going to be hard enough healthy, Tradius. I'm already getting radiation alarms...more rads than we expected. And that crash probably ruined our seals."

Ahern nodded. "And we don't have a dedicated medic. Fucking great. I've got a hole in my suit, and my seal is definitely cracked."

Chu gave a thin, sardonic smile. "On the bright side, the mass core didn't explode."

Leng hissed as Chu began wrapping bandaging around his thigh. "Yet."

Ahern snorted. The man had a point.

Turning back to the cockpit, he sat in the seat and triggered the radio. "Airspace this is…shuttle 534-A. We're all alive, but this shuttle is going nowhere and we have some injuries. Also the mass core is down and we have no idea if it is stable or not."

The voice on the line had a grim tone to it. "Acknowledged. Be advised EAGL forces detonated four primitive – construction low yield nuclear EMP devices near designated landing zones. One hundred sixty four shuttles have gone down with no reply, and over two hundred are relaying distress and requesting medevac. We are attempting to move units into the area overland but ETA until arrival is over twelve hours. You are advised to dig in, treat injuries, and await pickup."

Ahern rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. "And if we determine this area is not safe?"

The radio was silent for long seconds before a harder voice spoke. "Per instructions from SA Command, discretion on the ground is up to the unit leader, soldier. If you're not in a good place then obviously you should get to a secure location, but we are going to have to scrub this exercise."

Ahern sighed, clicking the radio off. Turning back towards the passenger cabin, he glanced around. "EAGL detonated four EMP bombs, which explains why the VI is fried. Since the VI manages the mass core, we have no idea if it will go up or not."

Kyle hissed as he wrapped his left wrist in an ACE bandage, along with a cold compress, and nodded. "I see. I heard the airspace coordinator tell us to dig in."

Ahern snorted. "Yeah, fuck that noise. All it takes is one asshole with a grenade to pop the hatch and toss it in and we're paste, or the core blowing up, or the shuttle sinking into this muck and trapping us inside. I need a GPS fix of where the shit we are."

Sanders pulled her GPS unit out of her supply pack, and glanced around, finally finding a data port she plugged it into. While she did that, Ahern turned to Anderson. "We need a plan and decision on how to extract."

Anderson frowned, rotating his ankle and wincing. "That may not be wise, Captain. We've been ordered to hold position, after all. Given that the exercise is off, risking our lives in this swamp isn't smart."

Ahern sighed. "I couldn't give two shits about that right now. We stay here, we are fucking dead. Every shuttle that went down left a mess of a trail leading right to them, this one included. We can't see or do shit in this coffin. EAGL is going to be swarming this place soon, and we have no idea where other survivors are or any way to link up."

He pointed west. "Our main hope lies in getting the fuck out of here and moving towards the shuttles we're supposed to use for pickup."

Anderson's mouth tightened. "And how exactly do we do that when we're all injured with suits that aren't sealed any longer, sir? I don't want to be a target any more than you do, but we can at least make a perimeter around this shuttle and use it for cover and wait for pickup, rather than stumbling into the swamp with no clear destination."

Leng gave a whispery laugh as he glanced at his dosimeter. "The discussion is academic. They detonated a nuke in this area. If we don't move, we'll die long before relief gets here. That is assuming, of course, the mass core doesn't take out everything in a hundred foot radius when it goes up."

Florez grunted. "I can fucking walk and shoot. I'm with Ahern; get me the fuck out of here."

Ahern held up a hand. "This isn't a goddamned democracy." He turned to Anderson. "Listen, Lieutenant. My squad is getting the shit out of here. I can't order you to follow, but given that we're better off working together than splitting up, it is my strong suggestion."

He tightened his jaw, waiting to see what Anderson would do. _I swear to God Almighty if he looks at that Sanders girl for what to do I will leave them all to fucking rot._

Instead, Anderson frowned, and looked at Pellham. "Theo. Can we keep up in the shape we're in?"

The slightly bigger man shrugged. "Shit, dunno. I know sticking around in this dank fucking hole, begging some EAGL cracker to pop a slug in my ass is not happening. I figure if we get clear of the radiated area and onto some solid ground, we can set that tent Sanders brought and do some quick first aid, maybe even some battlefield sealing with tape and paste." He paused. "Dig in for the night, eat half our supplies before they get radiated, drink water, and force march overland."

Kyle nodded thoughtfully. "That is a good plan."

Anderson sighed. "We'll see."

X-LiBaS-X

Ahern would remember the nightmare march through the swamp for the rest of his life.

Not forty-five minutes after they gathered their gear and shuffled off, their radio picked up frantic communications from SA command in broken fragments. "All downed units, evacuate the area. I repeat, EVACUATE the area. EAGL forces picked up on incoming vector. Air support is still three hours out. Orbital units will be making overhead assaults but we cannot guarantee your safety."

Pellham swore so viciously even Ahern was impressed. Leng was more placid. "Did they just tell us they were going to orbitally bombard us?"

There was silence, and then Leng's whispery tones again. "Ah, fuck."

The pace of the group picked up, struggling against the muck. The heat was beyond oppressive, the smell so rank and vile it nearly made Ahern throw up. The swamp was full of badly mauled and decayed wildlife, horrifically mutated small animals and toxins.

An hour into the march, and a series of explosions rocked the area off to the east, along with thin trails of smoke leading upwards. Sanders pulled up her binocs, squinting, and then sighed. "Jesus. They have some kind of missile launchers; they just shot down a F-61."

Ahern grimaced. "Where are the goddamned gunships? The new mass effect ones?"

Kyle glanced around nervously. "Most of them are deployed in the Middle East to deal with the Nepal riots and in the Australia Reef Protectorate against pirates. The rest are mostly in the big arcologies – even if they scrambled everything they had, Tradius, southeastern America is mostly deserted. The only major city is Miami, which is not a military base."

He nodded, even as Saracino held up a hand. "Incoming."

Chu tucked himself next to a rotting, massive, oak, and pulling down the tiny flexible keyboard he controlled his drones with. "Direction?"

Saracino nodded to the north, as the rest of the two squads found what cover they could. "I saw a blur through the foliage in my scope. Couldn't make it out, something brown."

A drone hummed as it soared off to the north, while Chu watched the jerky, low-fi camera feed on a USB monitor strapped to his knee. "Shitty wifi linkage is better than none." He cursed a second later.

"We're fucked. Four ABC war robots, headed right for us, along with a bunch of guys in plasti-camo ponchos and lots of guns and old American flags."

Pellham sneered. "Fucking EAGL." He turned to Ahern. "We're punching out, right?"

Anderson hissed. "We won't be able to move fast enough to outrun them for long, and we'll leave a trail if we aren't careful."

Pellham grunted, checking his shotgun. "Maybe, but fighting four ABC's is goddamned suicide."

Ahern was looking at Saracino. "How many can you drop?"

The man only smirked. "I'm unhurt. If Chu-chu can distract them with his drone…and if Mr. Richards is willing to provide heavy cover fire with his minigun, I think I can do this."

Ahern nodded. "Kyle, Rachel, Anderson. Flanking firing line, behind that fallen oak over there. Use flares to distract the ABC's if they start to close on us. Richards, tuck in where Chu is and provide long range distraction fire."

He turned to Leng and Sanders. "Get back behind the further tree line and take the radio." He handed it to Leng. "If we buy it call in an airstrike and try to get clear."

Leng arched one eyebrow. "Why us?"

Ahern sneered. "You two are the least useful in a fight with war robots and the most likely to get killed. Get moving." He ignored the hurt expression on Sanders face, tucking down next to Saracino.

The man was in his own little trance, eyes closed, feeling the wind, and then opened one eye and put it to the scope. "Bang bang bang bang."

The sniper rifle jerked, once, twice, again. In the distance, screams were heard. He fired a fourth shot, and after a second a loud mechanized voice spoke.

"TARGET SENSOR IMPAIRED. HOSTILES DETECTED. FIRING."

The unmistakable sound of flechette miniguns tore through the swamp, along with more firing. Ahern looked at Saracino. "The hell?"

The man only grinned. "Dropped what looked like the seniors, and then shot out the lead ABC war robots sensor package. It was an older model A. The rest are model B, sensors are armored to prevent that shit, but we made the odds better."

He winced as missiles exploded, and then a heavy crash sounded. "Fuck, they took the rogue one down…but they lost nine people and one of the robots is also barely moving."

Kyle spoke, checking his rifle. "The odds are, if not good, at least acceptable now."

Pellham shook his head. "You people are fucking crazy. But what the hell. You only die once."

Ahern rolled his neck as the EAGL terrorists broke the tree line, looking pissed off. "Hey, shitfuckers! Smile!"

The sound of his taunt was lost in the roar of Richards' minigun fire.


	8. Chapter 8

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of firefights, and tacky euphemisms like EAGL_

* * *

The Mark VII Atomic-Biological-Chemical Pacification Robots were a reminder of older times. Deployed en masse in the Days of Iron by Victor Manswell, the heavily built robots were designed for three purposes – to aid in removing hazardous material threats, to pacify areas for settlement and the Iron Guard, and to assist communities in fighting off bandits, raiders or other lawless types.

Many ABC robots were deployed to the American Deep South, where they toiled endlessly, moving contaminated dirt, destroying areas of heavy biological infestation or out of control nanite ponds with fire, and cutting a swathe through bandits, mutant animals, and resistance groups. As time went on, many broke down, many others began malfunctioning, and more than a few were hacked.

The three remaining ABC war robots were examples of what years of neglect did to such machines. Their once gleaming armored surfaces were pitted with rust and old blast damage, corroded down to nothing in more than a few places, and their movements were sluggish and full of hitches. The flamethrowers on their arms were still lit, though, and the flechette miniguns spun with a low hum as the robots stomped forward, feet coated in muck as they lifted them slowly one after another.

Using the robots as cover, the pack of men in camo plastic parkas and American flag headbands looked thin and emaciated. They scattered as Richard's heavy GE minigun spun up and fired, a line of depleted uranium slugs carving across the damp air to strike the most damaged ABC robot in the head and upper chest. It gave a hard metallic cry, as if stricken, and fell heavily to the ground with a massive splash, trails of black smoke emerging from its smallish head.

Ahern fired several shots at a running EAGL soldier, his second and third shots hitting his target. One shot blew a hole in the man's knee, sending him tumbling, the other caught him in the upper left chest, staining his poncho with blood even as it spun him around to fall face first into the swamp. Florez, Kyle, Pellham and Anderson all opened up then, each cleanly targeting an EAGL terrorist and taking them out, some quickly – and some not, as Pellham seemed to delight in putting no less than four slugs into his target, leaving the man a screaming, broken thrashing pile of limbs, blooding the shallow muck and water around his body.

The two remaining bots were not idle, tracking targets, turning slowly and awkwardly to change headings. The leftmost robot fired its flechette minigun in Kyle's direction, and the big man cursed as he flung himself into a roll. The tree he was using for cover was shredded, slowly toppling over with a groan. Kyle came to a stop behind another low log, spraying covering fire from his rifle, bullets spanging uselessly off the armored behemoth. Both Florez and Kyle counterfired on it, but their Lancer rifles simply didn't have the firepower to get past the heavy armored skin, and it triggered it's flamethrower at Florez, forcing her to relocate and cover her retreat with scattered bursts of wild fire.

The other robot took aim at Richards, clearly the biggest threat. The tree he and Ahern were behind was made of sterner stuff, however, and the flechette burst mostly embedded itself uselessly. Ahern cursed savagely as a single razor sharp flechette tore across his arm, a line of pain and hot blood spring forth right through the armor.

Richards swung out, firing again at the closest war robot, the stream of explosive tracers dancing up the things chest and onto its arm, which exploded with a loud bang and segments of shrapnel flying about. A second later, the minigun swung in a rapid, badly aimed arc, slewing across the field to impact the second war robot, but at an angle.

Ahern glanced back, frowning at the sudden inaccuracy. He saw that one of the EAGL soldiers had shot Richards, and the big man's arm was bleeding heavily, as he let go of the trigger. "Shit, can't aim like this!" Despite his strength and size, controlling the massive minigun was clearly an effort – and no human could fire one with only one good arm.

Ahern nodded, pulling him into better cover, and then popped up, cursing as he sprayed automatic fire. He heard the drones of Chu kick off, one firing its own weapon at a terrorist, sending that one dead to the ground, but it was shot out of the sky a second later. He aimed at the war machine, firing several shots even as it burst fired its minigun towards Anderson.

The machine jerked, aim thrown off, but Anderson gave a cry of pain as he fell, rifle slipping from his fingers as he clutched his arm. Florez, nearby, cursed, and opened fire again. Chu scampered across the field, spraying shots, and skidded next to Anderson. With a grunt, he helped the bigger man stagger into the relative safety of a low, heavy outcrop of stone, covered in mosses and stains.

Saracino continued to fire calmly at long range, killing five more terrorists, before beginning to drive shots into the ABC robot's knees, shoulder and head. One of his sniper shots hit something critical and the machine jerked suddenly, its minigun deactivating and flailing about in a circle.

Three EAGL soldiers, with SMG's and grenades, rushed them. Pellham gut-shot one with his shotgun, popping up out of cover and snatching the live grenade out of the wounded man's hand. He flung it at the ABC war robot, before pausing to savagely drive the butt of his weapon into his enemy's skull.

The other two ran towards Ahern. He dropped one with a burst, but the other flung his grenade in their direction. Before he even realized what his body was doing, Ahern had flipped his Lancer rifle in his hands and swung at the grenade.

There was a clink of metal and a surprised look on the EAGL terrorist's face before the grenade flew right back him – one that vanished a second later as the device exploded. Shrapnel rained down on Ahern and Richards, but at a further distance, and their armor absorbed that. The EAGL terrorists were not so lucky, two of them caught flat out by the explosion and sent to the ground, faces and upper bodies so much torn up meat.

The grenade Pellham had thrown at the ABC war robot did little. The robot merely stomped on it, the explosion not doing much to damage it, although it left it stumbling about a bit for its footing. It was clearly still messed up from whatever Saracino had hit, but it lifted its flamethrower gamely. The gout of burning plasma erupted out; searing the tree Pellham was hiding behind into crumbling, crackling ruin. More flames washed at the surface of the swamp itself, sending up thick clouds of scalding steam.

Pellham bolted out of cover, but took several more shots from the EAGL soldiers in better cover, coming to a rolling tumble behind another log, clutching his leg. "Shit, shit shit! Rich, minigun that fucking thing! We ain't doing dick to it!"

Richards grimaced, pain wracking his features as he struggled to aim the heavy weapon, but a second later more EAGL crashed through the undergrowth. Two immediately died from a single shot from Saracino, two more from a wild burst from Rachel, but the remaining four opened fire on Richards.

He was hit twice, falling down heavily wounded. Ahern lunged for the minigun, even as the ABC war robot began to twitch, and held down the trigger desperately, bracing it as best he could.

He was immediately knocked over, the weapon flying out of his hands due to the recoil – but he saw his burst had hit the big machine in the lower chest, shattering the armor and coring it out. It crashed down, splashing filthy water into the eyes of several nearby EAGL soldiers.

Florez and Kyle took that opportunity to open fire on them, cutting them down, while the other EAGL ducked into cover. For almost twenty seconds the sounds of heavy gunfire rang from all directions – Pellham firing his pistol, trying to drive one of them out of cover.

Saracino shot one through the eye, sneering as several return shots all missed. "Aren't these guys supposed to be shouting 'Murica' and all that shit?"

One of the EAGL soldiers, a muscle-bound older man with an American flag tied around his head, spat. "Shut up, traitor!" The man's silvery hair hung down below his shoulders, as he brandished a battered but still functional heavy rifle with a rusty bayonet at its front. "Killed a lot of you fascist bastards today, gonna kill me some more!"

Saracino answered him by putting a bullet in his throat, then his eye, blowing the back of his skull all over his nearby teammates. "Careful, there, don't lose your head." Saracino ducked behind a thick oak, evading the enraged counterfire of the fallen man's comrades, almost casually putting a shot through another one of them, turning the man's throat into a gory tunnel before the victim's head literally came right off.

Florez gave an amazingly girlish giggle at the morbid sight.

Ahern eyed the remaining soldiers, and cursed. There were still nine of them, and both Kyle and Pellham were wounded. Richards was down, and Rachel was bleeding from what looked like a bullet graze. Chu was unhurt, but both his drones were down, and he had to tend to Anderson – who was completely down, from what he could see. Ahern didn't see how they could shoot their way out of this one.

In the back of the EAGL forces, two men suddenly went down quietly. A third turned, only to have a sword slam through his eye socket. Before anyone else could act, Kai Leng had grabbed the man's weapon, spraying a full burst into the backs of the EAGL terrorists in front of him.

Several of them fell, and two more bolted out of cover, trying to shoot at Leng. Saracino dropped one a second later; the shot bisecting the man's shoulder blade in a spray of blood, a second shot blowing his head clean off. Florez, a heavily wounded Anderson, and Ahern himself – having recovered his Lancer, albeit covered in muck – all opened fire as well. Three more went down.

The last EAGL shot Kai Leng in the shoulder and leg with panicky fire, falling seconds later to an angry storm of pistol shots from Kahlee Sanders, erupting from the underbrush. Shots struck the man's face, throat, knee, and chest, sending him careening back dead.

The Chinese man wiped his sword on his enemy's pant leg, wincing in pain, before Kahlee got to his side and helped levered him up. Ahern glanced around, pausing to put a round into a still moving EAGL thug, before walking over to Chu.

"Saracino! Spotter, let us know if anyone is incoming." He barked the order even as he knelt down next to Chu. "He gonna live?"

Chu was applying makeshift bandages to Anderson's shoulder. "Yeah, but he won't be much good in a fight."

Anderson himself bore an expression of stoic pain through the port of his helmet. "I've had worse. I can always brace my rifle."

Chu chuckled. "Good luck finding it in the muck it fell into. Or getting it to fire again." He tied off the simple cloth and plastic binding, before pulling out a roll of Saran-wrap. Ahern arched an eyebrow, and Chu shrugged.

"They don't exactly make a swamp first aid kit. Figured it would keep it dry until we can get somewhere for real first aid, at least."

Ahern chuckled. "Good thinking. Fucking EAGL assholes tore us a good one." He stood, and glanced around. Everyone was up and moving – even Richards, although he was bleeding in more than one location. "We need to get moving as soon as we can."

Sanders took a deep breath. "Kai took a shot in the leg, and he was already dealing with a crack in his femur from the crash."

Ahern gave the man a cool look. "Can you keep up?"

Leng merely nodded. "It's keep up or die, no?"

Pellham groaned, grimacing. "Fuck that. No offense, Captain, but we try this bullshit about one speed and we'll be easy pickings. We are all hurt now, and the important thing is getting the fuck out of this goddamned exercise alive, ain't it?"

Ahern gritted his teeth. "Yes, it is. This is why we have to move quickly. The entire fucking swamp is probably teeming with those EAGL retards and their fucking war robots that they have hacked. If we were healthy, with our normal gear, and not soaking in radiation every second we'd slaughter the fuckers by the hundred – as it is, we barely survived a patrol."

Saracino walked up, sniffing as he stepped over corpses, pausing every so often to check his handiwork. "This is no patrol, Ahernia. It's four war robots, and there were fifteen of them or more. This is probably the heaviest hitters they had – some of them had modern weapons, not cheap AR-15 knockoffs." He kicked at an older model Spearman rifle, the direct predecessor to the Lancer.

Pellham spat. "If that's the hardest they can roll and they didn't even kill one of us, I still say bring it the fuck on – better that than leaving someone behind. I ain't rolling like that – not even for that asshole Leng."

Leng sighed. "Pity the situation is not reversed. I'd leave you to die in a heartbeat."

Pellham only grinned. "This is WHY I'm draggin' you along, asshole. Watch you suffer."

Saracino suddenly smiled. "Well, I can get behind that kind of thing. I'm unhurt; between me and Ms. Sanders we can drag him along, surely." He glanced around the clearing. "We need to move now, though, that tree the one robot set on fire is sending up smoke anyone nearby can see, and the firefight wasn't exactly quiet."

Chu nodded, glancing at Ahern, who sighed heavily. "Fine. Pell, Kyle, help Richards. Florez, Chu, help Anderson. I'll help Sanders with Leng – Saracino, we need your eyes and for you to be point."

Saracino only smiled coolly. "Oooh, do I get promoted too?"

Kyle sighed tiredly as he levered Richards up, wincing against his own wounds."No one would promote you, jackass." He paused, frowning at himself. "…I cursed."

Ahern burst out laughing at the perplexed expression on his face.


	9. Chapter 9

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of survival, and hating on Michael Saracino_

* * *

Ahern gazed around the swampy muck in disgust. "This is just goddamned wonderful." He grimaced as the film-badge on his belt beeped apologetically, indicating their radiation exposure was still rising.

Behind him, Rachel and Kahlee were spreading out the tent-pak Kahlee had lugged along, while Chu was doing his best to stitch up the wounds in Leng's leg. Anderson was laid out on a narrow strip of rock thrust up from the swamp, grimacing in pain, while Richards was putting pressure on his shoulder with a pad of gauze.

Saracino, in the branches of a gnarled, dark-looking oak that had miraculously managed to cling to life, swung his scope around. "Ah, cheer up. We're alive, the EAGL are dead, and we got off some truly devastating puns." He paused. "I'd go so far as to say it was absolutely pun-ishing."

Kai looked at the man, and then glanced over to the bulk of Pellham, sitting by his side. "…it occurs to me, Pel, that as much as I hate you, I may hate Mr. Saracino more."

Kyle muttered darkly. "Welcome to the club." He adjusted his helmet, and then returned to placing sealant tape around the joints of his armor. "What is our plan now?"

Anderson gritted his teeth. "I'm down for the count. Richards is, too. None of us is fully effective, and we can't move fast. For now, I think our best bet is what was suggested earlier – patch ourselves up as well as we can, eat, and march overland – at least out of the swamp."

Florez sourly nodded. "Or light off the flares for medical assistance. They did say they scrubbed the exercise."

Ahern shook his head. "Maybe so, but I don't see the fucking smart side of lighting off a giant fuck-ass flare which will draw ever EAGL fucker from here to the gulf, not to mention the wildlife. If the report was right, they're going to be low on shuttles anyway, and I want to be dug the fuck in somewhere before we light that bitch."

Kahlee finished setting up the tent. "First, let's move the wounded in here one at a time and see what we can do with our limited supplies."

Ahern shared watches with Pellham as everyone was rotated through the tent, Chu and Sanders doing their best. Limited to surgical thread, alcohol, disinfectant, and a booster of anti-rad and antibiotic drugs, it took a good hour and a half to finish up.

Kai Leng was still walking a touch gingerly, but was mobile. Richards was still in bad shape, but could hold and fire his minigun. Anderson had snagged one of the old EAGL rifles to replace his missing Lancer, and the rest of them were still armed. They gathered around a sullen fire Kyle had managed to get going, the wispy black smoke rising into the darkening skies.

Ahern's tablet was busted, but he'd brought along a laminated paper map and spread it out over a half-rotted log. "Best I can figure, we're around here – mid northern edge of the Okefenokee. Once we get past old highway 441, the ground firms up all the way into the ruins of Valdosta State University. "

He glanced around. "Valdosta may or may not be overrun with EAGL fanatics. But if it is, that also means they might have shuttles, or at least ground vehicles. There's also the chance we can blow their communications or their leadership – saving the lives of the rest of the Marines in this clusterfuck."

Anderson nodded. "We cannot forget we are still Alliance soldiers, and our duty is to _protect_."

Kai Leng snorted. "This approach reeks of a heroic death – something that does not appeal to me. We are poorly suited for combat against entrenched opponents."

Ahern shook his head. "If they had visible fortifications they would have been taken out already. And they've got to have most of their people out in this swamp, murdering our goddamned brother and sister marines." His jaw tightened. "Are you some kind of fucking weak-ass too scared to die?"

The Asian man's own eyes narrowed. "Hardly. But there is a vast difference in fighting to achieve a goal and blindly throwing away one's life. You are saying we should march – while wounded – through fifty plus miles of the worst environment on the planet, thick with hostile wildlife and with radiation. And then, assault a fixed position when our heavy weapons specialist is heavily wounded and we have no siege or explosive weapons – in hope of breaking leadership and comms when we don't even know if EAGL command and control is there or not."

Kahlee touched Kai's arm, and he grimaced before exhaling, glancing at her before back at Ahern. "Some of us have things to lose more valuable than our careers, Captain."

Saracino coughed. "Far be it from me to point this out, loverboy, but you ain't in that boat alone. Kyle here has a hot wifey and a two-year old, Ahern is hitched with the daughter of Big Adkins, and Chu's a fancy ass bong or dong or whatever you call it, even if he is illegitimate."

Anderson grimaced. "_Enough_. Captain, I do agree with your analysis. But for the sake of argument…are there other alternatives?"

Ahern sighed, tapping the map and then gestured to the north. "There's also the ruin of a small town called Waycross. That's only ten miles away, while Valdosta is, as Leng said, fifty five, half of that swamp. If we could make it there, lighting a flare might be more workable – assuming that anyone is looking. Even if they aren't, there's a local Alliance Ecological Studies Service facility a few miles north of the ruins. There's likely a radio or something there where we can signal for pickup."

Kyle nodded. "Yes, and medical supplies, anti-rad drugs – if it's actually manned, maybe medical help."

Ahern nodded. "The problem is, we'd be completely exposed with no cover most of the way and it heads towards the Atlanta Exclusion Zone, so it's stiff with old ABC robots still doing clean up. Most of them won't recognize us and they didn't give us command codes. The station was destroyed by accident once before by the things, and if we run into a big batch of them …"

Florez shuddered. "Fuck that. I'd rather take my chances with the fucking swamp." She sighed. "Why not just force-march to Jacksonville?"

Pellham shook his head. "We'd have to go the length of the swamp, sister. Right into the really, really nasty parts – the places where you go in and don't come the fuck back out. And they dumped most of the contaminated earth from Jacksonville and the outlying areas in a berm to keep the swamp wildlife out, so we'd hit theta bands of rads. Not to mention it's almost a hundred and fifteen miles."

Kahlee shook her head. "We don't have the rations or medical supplies for that anyway. Or the stamina. Blood loss and rad dosing is going to kill us even if dehydration doesn't. Our heatsinks are already gummed and eventually we'll be overwhelmed."

She folded her arms. "Waycross is closer, but the entire town is ruins, and we'd have to skirt around those because I don't think they did any enviro work on it. Could be EAGL there, too."

Florez drank from her water bottle. "Chu, any chance you could get a drone up to scout?"

He gestured to the flap of canvas he was seated in front of. "I don't have my usual tools. Trying to cobble together something from the two drones I had….but I don't know how well that will – "

He cut off at the sound of accelerator fire, and explosions from the north and east. Saracino swiveled his sniper in that direction and cursed. "Shit."

Ahern got to his feet. "Report."

"Several broken squads – six or seven, maybe more – running combat with a group of ABC's and EAGL in a skirmish line." He lowered the sniper. "Tradius, there's at least fifteen ABCs."

Kai swung his head to the west. "We must move. And swiftly."

Kyle frowned. "What about the marines they're in combat with? We're doing nothing?"

Ahern met the eyes of Anderson, who looked away after a moment. "Strike the tent. Chu, pack your shit. Kyle, support Richards. Sanders, help Leng. I'll help Anderson. Florez, help with Pellham. Saracino, hot overwatch. We move in five, towards Valdosta."

Anderson merely nodded, while Kai looked frustrated and worried. "Are we going all the way in, or swinging north after we clear the area?"

Ahern knelt, packing up his meager gear into his travel bag. "Dunno yet. We need to find a place to hole up and let your scouting group do some scouting. If these fuckers are already north of us, then we have no choice but to head west."

It took a bit more than five minutes to get moving, the sounds of the firefight not getting closer or further away. Saracino had a grimace of disgust on his features as he slung his sniper and climbed down. "It's a goddamned massacre. More EAGL coming from the north. Most of the marines are down."

Kai Leng, moving with a limp and Kahlee steadying him, lead, eyes picking over the terrain. "Follow me. Precisely. We cannot afford to leave a trail, or fall into a bog hole." His sword gleamed with condensation, even as the last light in the sky began fading into bruised scarlets and eldritch purples.

Hooting, echoing cries sounded, along with a disgusting gurgling sound every now and again. In single file they crept along, weapons clutched so tight that knuckles were sore. Wounds throbbed and trickles of blood fell onto the soupy surfaces of the swamp, only for Saracino, in the back, to splash water on any droplets that didn't fall into water.

A roaring, booming snarl and the scream of humans in the distance startled them, only for the scream to be cut off in a meaty, thudding sound followed by splashing. Ahern slowly exhaled and motioned Leng to continue.

What felt like an eternity was still no doubt hours, marching in pitch blackness pierced only by the slender beam of Leng's flashlight, with a red lens cover to avoid ruining their night vision. Vast clouds of insects, disturbed by their passage, settled on them, scuttling and searching for a way past their armor, attracted to the bullet holes in the suits hastily sealed with saran wrap and medical glue.

The ground began to slope faintly upwards, as they broke through a tangle of rotted branches into a wide clearing. Kai immediately held a hand up in a stop-break-cover signal, and the two squads crouched, moving into a spread line as quietly as they could.

The clearing was wrecked, a single shuttle shot down in its midst. The broken bodies of marines lay around it, most shot to pieces, along with the hulking shape of an ABC war robot slumped on the ground.

Nine shallow graves topped with tiny American flags made Ahern sneer. He glanced around the clearing again. "Saracino, cover. Kyle, on me. Florez, be ready for a cover back one-two move."

She nodded, and he took a breath and stepped forward, the ground muck firming up slightly under his boots. He croutchwalked to the shuttle, eyes scanning the darkness and the fell, almost primal mass of the swamp tree line, seeking movement.

The marines had been badly injured by the crash, from the signs of the fight, and had put up a good account – there were only seven of them and they'd taken out nine of the enemy plus an ABC War Robot.

He ducked into the shuttle itself, frowning. Unlike theirs, the power was still on, the cockpit still illuminated. Three more marines hung in their harnesses inside, faceplates blood spattered and limbs or spines at impossible to survive angles. He shook his head again and moved past them to the cockpit.

"VI, craft status. Ahern, serial 49292."

The computer made a sound. "VI online. Shuttle nominal. Flight control systems: damaged but functional. Mass effect core: damaged but functional. Fuel systems: online. Navigation controls: compromised. Environmental systems: compromised. Communications systems: compromised."

He tapped a few keys. "Damage to communications systems?"

"Physical damage to antenna. Must be replaced. Software and communications equipment otherwise undamaged. "

He nodded. "Can the shuttle be flown?"

"Automatic flight systems are offline. Manual control possible, but FCS is damaged, as well as mass core. Range of safe operation is very small."

He smiled. "Define 'very small'."

"No definition possible. Safety regulations prevent unsafe operation beyond core threshold limits. Current threshold identified at roughly 45% of operational capacity. Current capacity is 67%."

He nodded to himself again, and then stepped back out, making an 'all-clear huddle up' sign with his right hand.

He waited until the group gathered round. "VI's working and the shuttle will fly, but the autonav is down. Can any of you fly?"

Both Pel and Kai nodded, and Ahern smiled. "Thing is, it's damaged. Said something about the core threshold limits or some shit. Comms are down too. Still, if we fly nap of the earth…"

Kai's eyes narrowed. "Then we need to define our target. The North may be unsafe, but so is Valdosta, no doubt. Procuring communications would seem to be our highest priority."

Anderson nodded, as did Kyle and Chu, but Florez shook her head. "Is it? Look, I don't wanna sound … well, paranoid like Chu – but if these EAGL fucks have that many ABCs and are picking apart marine teams … is it possible someone in Command is a traitor?"

Leng's eyes narrowed, and Pel sighed. Chu looked up, thoughtfully. Saracino gave a low whistle. "Damn, Rachel. You hopped on the conspiracy Chu-Chu too? Am I all alone in sanity?"

Leng's voice held a pleading note. "Captain, permission to stab Chief Saracino."

Ahern snorted. "Denied. Saving that pleasure for myself." He looked at Florez. "Your point?"

She exhaled. "Maybe we wanna be careful in where we go. Fixing the communications hardware should be easy if we find another shuttle."

Anderson frowned. "Did you check the sensors? Maybe we can get a fix on a remote shuttle – link up with other marines."

Ahern sighed. "Enough. Kyle. You and … Kahlee get the dead out of that shuttle. I'll bury 'em while Chu and Anderson go through the shuttle VI and get it set to fly. Scavenge weapons and supplies from the dead – they won't need them – especially any explosives or supply kits."

Chu glanced at the nearest corpse, still holding its Lancer rifle, and frowned. "…why didn't the EAGL guys loot them, I wonder? Surely they would need more advanced weapons."

Leng's eyes narrowed further. "Do not touch the corpses. Stand back." As the group backed away, he gingerly approached one, lifting the edge of one arm with his blade, then hissed. "A mine is under the body. The rest are also no doubt booby trapped."

Ahern sighed. "Disarm them?"

Leng shook his head. "Very risky…but they have turned the bodies all onto their backs. If we want to access their packs, we'll have to. I'll need tools."

Chu nodded, pulling out his toolpak. "I got most of what you'd need, though no electrogels."

The other Asian man nodded, murmuring something in Chinese. Chu laughed and said something back, and Kyle raised an eyebrow. "Confucius?"

Leng nodded, moving to the corpse furthest away and instructing them to stand back. "It is better to be grateful for what you have than to complain about what you do not." He took a deep breath. "I would recommend standing further back."

Kahlee clenched her fists. "We can manage – "

Pel's hand came down on her shoulder. "Kae, you know goddamned better. You really think Kai would do this shit and risk his pretty boy ass if we didn't really have to?" He glanced back at Leng. "You think they booby trapped the shuttle too?"

Leng shook his head. "If they had, the Captain would be in pieces. Now be silent, oaf. I need to concentrate."

Pel scoffed. "Whatever, slant-eye."

Kahlee slugged him. "Stop calling him that!"

Ahern shook his head, and Saracino climbed on top of the shuttle to perform lookout duty. "Really. All you got is slant-eye? I give Chu much worse shit than that."

Pel looked up at him. "Can your token chink kill a man with a knife at sixty feet?"

Saracino mused on this. "No." He paused, firing at something suddenly, and the bulk of some kind of heavily mutated dog collapsed in the distance. "Can yours rig up a drone to give you a wedgie at four AM from a hundred miles away?"

Pel looked at Chu, then at the rest of the group, and then at Kahlee Sanders. "And you say _we're _fucked in the head?"

* * *

**_Author's Notes :_**

_Touched up some mistakes and problems in the first chapter. _


	10. Chapter 10

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of why it isn't five by five, and Shepard's Dad  
_

* * *

Ahern glanced around the shuttle, and grimaced. "Alright, what we got?"

The situation was not as grim as it could have been, but it wasn't good either, in Ahern's opinion. It had taken Leng almost a full thirty minutes to disarm the cheap but lethal frag mines under the corpses of the slain marines around the shuttle. While Saracino had kept watch, occasionally shooting something in the distance, Ahern had dug graves in the sloopy earth himself and buried all the dead Marines.

In the middle of this, large and loud explosions had sounded far to the east, which Ahern could only assume were Alliance forces kinetically bombarding the main drop region to kill EAGL terrorists. Those blasts were at least twenty miles away and were still powerful enough to stir slight breezes a few minutes later.

Ignoring that, he'd finished the graves, while the team worked on the shuttle or field stripping the dead. The haul had been a godsend, as they found armor patches, tools, medkits, scopes, and a set of scouting binocs Leng had immediately appropriated.

Going through the dead Marines's packs had thankfully been free of finding personal possessions, and they had rearmed themselves and taken what supplies they could. The team seemed to have been a heavy scout unit with a medical focus, and Chu had been able to fix up his drones while Kahlee and Kyle were able to do a bit more first aid, including a proper full sling for Richard's arm.

Anderson, along with some minor assistance from Chu at some points, was able to bring the shuttle's engines online and get it hovering, although said engine was making a distressing amount of noise that didn't sound exactly healthy. He'd shut the shuttle down, and now Ahern was pondering his next moves, given he had a semi-working shuttle and a fully armed pair of teams again.

He laid his paper map down on the shuttle's decking and knelt. "Alright, decision time. Or at least, input time. Assuming the shuttle GPS isn't fucked, we're here. We somehow missed the 441 highway – maybe it got eaten by the swamp – but we're just north of it. We have a shuttle with enough fuel and range – call it thirty miles or so – to get us to several locations. "

He pulled out a marker and made an X on the map. "OpFor remains unknown in deployment and numbers. Saracino saw EAGL jackasses coming from the north and east here. Makes no sense if they're operating out of Valdosta, plenty of sense if the fuckers are somewhere in Waycross. If they're in Waycross, they'll have the entire northern sections under watch, so any northward travel is out."

Kyle narrowed his eyes. "Why would the EAGL avoid Valdosta to set up in Waycross? It seems, while ruined, to offer more substantial shelter from rads and armada storms than the ruins of Waycross."

Ahern shrugged. "Dunno. And it's possible that Waycross is an outpost – they may be in both places."

He exhaled. "Comms are out, so we don't know what's going on and we can't send a message. Our range is unknown, but we can definitely fly the shuttle a good thirty or forty miles. That puts our hard limits for distance smack dab in the Atlanta Exclusion Zone to the north, and right into the Mkeofen Delta expanse in the south." He gestured to the harsh red hashing over that region. "Both of which, like the approach to Jacksonville, is a no go due to heavy rads."

"That leaves us with two options: head to Valdosta and hope to find parts to repair comms with there and / or take out any EAGL, or circle pattern to find another downed shuttle and cobble together what we can."

Leng nodded. "Given the condition the shuttle is in, and the fact that we don't know if it is crawling with EAGL – or already looted of any useful parts – flying it right at Valdosta seems...risky."

Pel muttered. "Mo' like goddamned suicide on a _hunch_."

Ahern only smirked. "The third option is heading back the way we've already come, and linking up with more survivors. Given the Alliance just bombed the shit out of the region, at least some other Marines had to have survived and are headed in our direction. If we get enough of them together we'll be too tough for EAGL to take on in dribs and drabs..."

Chu smiled. "And have the manpower to investigate Valdosta, or Waycross. Workable, boss."

Anderson grimaced. "We either go straight into the possible lion's den, or back towards what may be friendly reception or may be a mass of EAGL soldiers. Iffy odds either way, Captain – I don't like our options limited that sharply."

Ahern shrugged. "That's what command is all about, Lieutenant. It's why we're in the Solguard. I don't see us getting the hell out of this swamp any other way unless we stay put and wait for rescue, which is going to fucking take days and days."

Anderson held up a hand, his features taut but also tired looking. "And I am not arguing that. But the shuttle makes us a target, either way we go. EAGL may have shot their bolt with that EMP, but we don't know that – and how they figured out the Alliance was planning to do a top-secret trial here is also troubling, as Corporal Florez pointed out."

Ahern wished he could remove his helmet to rub his temples. "You have a good alternative, Lieutenant, or you just playing fucking devil's advocate?"

Kahlee frowned. "What he's saying, Captain, is it's a big risk either way, but it's a bigger risk if Valdosta is hot, or if EAGL has a traitor in Alliance Command. If they're coming out of Waycross and that's out, isn't there anywhere in the shuttle's range clear of rads where we could hole up?"

Ahern studied the map, then shook his head. "After you clear the swamp it's mostly flats and slight hills. Line of sight for miles and miles in all directions. If we can just get the goddamned antenna fixed on this piece of shit, it all becomes academic – we can call in for a pickup, and have them hone in on us by radio beacon, moving around if need be just in case EAGL over hears or is given a tip."

The blonde folded her arms. "In that case, I recommend we go east and try to find more marines. We may find another shuttle, after all, and it's less of a risk than going into possibly a hostile area we have no information about."

Ahern shrugged. "Kyle, tactical assessment?"

The big man returned the shrug, facial expression dubious through the clear faceplate. "Hard to say. We're dealing with an extreme paucity of data. I would, however, prefer to err on the side of caution. Even if Valdosta is not overrun by EAGL, there's no hard guarantee it would have parts we need. Whereas one of the shuttles, by means of probability alone, must have useful parts for our own shuttle. There can be no possible friendlies at Valdosta, if we head east we might find some."

A few seconds of silence and Ahern thinking was broken by Saracino firing, twice. "Whatever you idiots do, make up your minds. The corpses are attracting more and more wildlife. If some mutant alligator shows up I'm not sure this popgun will stop it."

Anderson met Ahern's gaze. "Your call, Captain. My team would, I think, prefer east to west, and it sounds like yours would as well."

Ahern nodded. "Fine. In that case, get this bird in the air, and except for Leng and Richards, strap in. You two, hatch duty. Whoever is driving this shitbuggy, head east as best you can on a curved zig-sweep pattern and keep us just above the treeline."

Anderson nodded to Pel. "You're up. See what you can do, but carefully. She handles pretty rough."

Pel cackled. "All the best bitches do, LT." He stood, and entering the cockpit, gingerly eased into the pilots seat while everyone else strapped in, tapping controls and flipping switches.

"Lesee...Fuel systems...fucked. Nav plot...fucked. INS, fucked. Core? Partially fucked." He frowned at the main display. "ADS controls...fucked."

He slammed a part of the console with his fist, which flickered and then lit up. "ADS controls working. Shuttle Shitbuggy is a go."

Saracino arched an eyebrow. "Chu, you have a percussive engineering challenger."

The Chinese officer sneered. "I'm amazed you can even pronounce 'percussive', Mike. Been reading the dictionary or something?"

The sallow faced sniper gave a smirk. "Just working out my tongue, you know." He waggled his eyebrows and leered at Rachel, who blew him a kiss. Kyle groaned and Kahlee looked intrigued.

Ahern stared fixedly at the floor. "...what did I do to get lumped in with you pack of disgraceful _fuckups_ I will never know."

Saracino snorted. "Beside banging the daughter of a Senator and having pictures of her naked in your pool splashed all over the news? Karma, my friend."

Ahern glared. "If there's any karma you'll be killed by someone who's worse at puns than you."

"Ha! Not fucking possible. I am the best." He paused. "You know why bicycles can't stand up? They're two-tired."

Leng glanced at him, then back at Ahern. "Permission to – "

Ahern snorted. "Ask me once we're out of this mess, Chief. Might take you up on that."

Pel touched several more controls and then lifted the control stick, and the shuttle pulled up. "Alright, in flight. We're...way out of the pipe, nineteen by six, and shifting." As he spoke, the shuttle gave a sickening lurch to the right, then readjusted. "Nineteen by seven. Fuckin' cheap ass minimum wage fuckers musta built this gyro out of Cheese Whiz."

The hatch door was still open, with the massive form of Richard across from it, mini-gun leveled. Kai Leng stood at the hatchway, harness clipped to the seat to let him lean out, and scanned with his looted pair of hand held binoculars.

Chu kept fiddling with the damaged electronics panel at the back of the shuttle, trying to adjust and repair something, while the rest just sat and waited in awkward, tired silence. After about ten minutes Ahern realized Florez had slumped into sleep and was gently resting against his shoulder.

He gave another sigh, thinking of another woman he'd much rather have on his shoulder.

The green, tangled muck of the swamp rolled by in slow review as they moved east, large sections of muck-laden water framed by stands of slowly rotting trees in some areas, a thick canopy of mutated and twisted plants and vines covering other areas entirely.

After almost twenty quiet minutes, Kai Leng stiffened, and spoke in a harsh whisper. "EAGL forces...call it three klicks. Or four. Heading westish, five ABCs with them. They have captives."

Ahern closed his eyes and balled his fists. "Goddammit. How many of the fuckers?"

The Chinese soldier did not lower the binocs. "Perhaps thirty. Possibly more. Flankers, maybe in the trees. At least a dozen captives." He paused. "...make that seven ABC robots. Have these criminals hacked every old Manswell bot in the entire southeast?"

Anderson frowned. "The hell is EAGL up to? Why take hostages? Why even pull this fucking stunt? The Alliance does not negotiate, ever, and it isn't like they are going to pull out of America."

Chu closed the panel he was working on as the internal lights flickered on. "I doubt very much that General Logain gives a shit. EAGL are the types of people who cannot or will not adapt, and see themselves as heroic. Personally, I think we should napalm the entire area, but given the ecological damage we already have, that's not practical."

Ahern wished he could spit. "In other words, don't ask why batshit crazies do batshit crazy things?"

Saracino gave a dark glare out the hatch. "Given who you're dealing with – and the amount of defective genetic material in the South even before the War – the answer for why they are taking live captives probably includes the phrase 'thems good eatins' somewhere in the logic."

Anderson paled and looked ill, while Kahlee spat an angry curse word. "I wouldn't put anything past those animals."

Soon enough they were out of sight, now skimming over the wider open brackish ponds. More than once Ahern could see something dark and thrashing in the water below, and found himself glad they'd not stumbled into anything really nasty in the dark march earlier. After another ten minutes, Leng leaned forward, and a moment later he spoke.

"Possible contacts, Captain. I see … a downed shuttle. Bearing zero five five. Looks … intact." He hissed. "...it is under attack – no ABC's, but more than a few EAGL. Perhaps ten or eleven. Fire being returned from within the shuttle, but the firing angle is awkward."

Ahern glanced at Anderson. "Alright, we go in hard and fast. Give them no time to dig in, and set up a killing crossfire. No ABCs means we can do this. Just follow our lead."

Anderson looked alarmed, but Leng's voice continued. "From here the shuttle antenna looks intact. It will not remain so if EAGL continues to assault the shuttle."

Ahern nodded. "Lieutenant Pellham, take us in, bearing oh five five, low as you can go. Kyle, Saracino, form on Lieutenant Richards and prepare for fire for effect."

He stood himself, unhooking the harness and grabbing the handholds on the ceiling of the shuttle, as it banked sharply to the north. He could hear the popping sounds of older Lancer rifles and the more aggressive snapping booms of Avengers, and he squared his shoulders. "Richards, lay down a line of fire in the middle of their group, and cover our landing. Florez, Kyle, on drop, flank and then a two-six arrow split. Saracino, snapshots. Pellham, once we drop angle the shuttle out of their line of fire."

Kai Leng looked at him. "And Kahlee, Chu, and myself?"

Ahern flicked the safety on the rifle. "Stay in the shuttle in case we get shot to pieces, if that happens, good fucking luck." He grinned, and slapped Richard on his unwounded shoulder. "Fire."

The GE mini-gun gave a howl as it erupted, bullets tearing through the air and through the scattered, lightly armored figures surrounding the shuttle and taking cover behind trees. Six of the figures were caught in the open and just came apart, even as Saracino opened fire, killing another.

With a yell, as the shuttle swooped low, Ahern dove from it, coming out of a roll. He splashed into a shallow, filthy puddle of muddy water and slide into cover behind a narrow boulder of rusted iron ore. He checked his suit for a breach, and finding none, popped up and opened fire immediately. His burst struck an older, gray-haired EAGL soldier wearing a blanket poncho center mass, sending him to the ground, even as Florez and Kyle jumped after him.

Two EAGL gunners, holding clunky and out of date heavy machine guns using actual gunpowder bullets, moved to attack them, but a pair of finely aimed shots from the grounded shuttle killed them both. Kyle slammed into the cover of a tree, firing as he did so, clipping one EAGL goon in the knee and spilling him from cover.

Saracino's rifle ended his life a moment later, as Florez calmly shot two more.

With a yell of "REPENSUM" the marines aboard the shuttle – four in all – stormed out, firing shotguns and rifles. The last six EAGL soldiers, now caught in an ugly crossfire, tried to duck back further into cover, only to be harried by Richard's mini-gun and unable to move.

A few more shots, and it was all over. The last EAGL fighter dropped his rifle with a cry as a burst from Florez shattered his face, and as he fell in the muck, a loud voice from the grounded shuttle barked out "Marines! Cease fire."

Ahern repeated the order, then yelled. "Pellham, land the shuttle nearby. Area's secure."

He then turned his attention to the three men and one woman emerging from the shuttle in battered, muddied armor suits. The woman and two of the men had sergeant stripes and the markings of Fifth Europa, while the leader was a lieutenant with a Solguard flash and the same symbol indicating he was in Europa's Fifth Company. All of them were littered with badly patched wounds and poorly sealed suit breaches.

Ahern exhaled. "Captain Ahern, Solguard, assault. With us is Lieutenant Anderson, Thanas, scout. Looks like you had a nasty dustup."

The officer, a finely-featured black man with what was visible of his hair behind the helmet done in thin dreadlocks, nodded, his dark blue eyes unusual. His expression eased as he came to his full height. "That we did, Captain. Thanks for the save. Lieutenant Michael Shepard, Interdiction, Europa. Formerly NYC DIV Solguard. The other squad was a scouting squad...I can only presume, if these EAGL came on us out of nowhere, they must have run into problems."

Ahern nodded. "We've seen a lot of EAGL, and a lot of ABC's under their command. If your scout team is still out there, they may be dead or … worse. EAGL captured some of the Marines we've seen."

Shepard gave a frown. "Well, that's not going to end well for anybody. I see your have a working shuttle – any chance we could get a lift the fuck out of here?"

Ahern shook his head. "I wish. Our shuttle works – sort of – but it only has about twenty mile range, maybe less at this point. Damaged. And our comms are down. We were looking for other downed shuttles, for repair parts."

Michael Shepard jerked a thumb backwards. "Our comms are fine – but the VI is dead, so we can't transmit. Engines look busted, but without a VI we can't diagnose what's wrong except it won't fly."

Ahern exhaled. "If comms are up...what are you getting? Anything from Command?"

The lieutenant grimaced. "It's … not good. Command advised us about three hours ago that the Commissars found six spies in the comms network people, and that it looks like someone leaked the exercise to EAGL just after that warrant officer checked the area out. High Command is furious and is routing a trio of cruisers to geosynchronous orbit, preparing to bombard Waycross and Valdosta in about an hour or so."

Saracino sniffed. "Good thing we weren't planning to _head there,_ right, Captain?"

Ahern snarled. "Shut up, asshole." He exhaled. "Sorry, Lieutenant. You were saying?"

Shepard gave a thin smile, blue eyes narrowing in humor. "Right now, it's going to be at least twenty four hours before they can send in relief shuttles. They're putting together an armored convoy in Jacksonville now along with some NBC trucks to try to breach the Jacksonville Break and get through the theta band rads to get us, but they don't know if that will work."

He glanced over his people, then back at Ahern. "Most of my people are pretty busted up, sir. None of us are really combat effective. What are your orders?"

Ahern smiled thinly. "First, we see if we can't fix up our comms. Then we see what Command has for is. And if they give us fucking stupid answers, we put our heads together and figure out a way out."

He jerked a thumb towards his own people. "I've got two medics – let's get your people looked at. Saracino – "

"I know, I know. Watch for bad guys. Christ."


	11. Chapter 11

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of a clusterfuck in command, and of brave 'patriots' defending 'freedom'.  
_

* * *

Ahern clicked off the radio with a grimace of distaste on his features.

It had taken a good hour to fix the antenna, mostly because they didn't have any detailed tools to work with. While each shuttle had a toolkit, it was intended more for patch jobs than fine electronics work, and Chu's hacked together soldering iron wasn't very precise. After that, they discovered the power leads from the engines were down, and thus waited another hour for two of the engineers from Shepard's team, working with Chu, to make sure the shuttle engines would work a bit longer and power the actual commlink.

Kahlee and Kyle had used the other shuttle – which could be sealed – to do some more in-depth first aid on Richards and Leng outside of their armor-suits. . Florez and Saracino huddled near the main shuttle, tediously going through their supplies and organizing things, and salvaging what they could from everyone's various kits.

Ahern, Anderson and Shepard tried to decide on a game plan with little results, since they were unsure of what was going on. Ahern's gut was telling him to see if a run to the northeast, past Waycross and completely out of radiated territories, might be the best option – find some place not overrun with fucking slug-cats and wait for pickup.

Anderson, on the other hand, wanted to look for more marines, while Shepard, still angry about the loss of one of his people, wanted to hit EAGL they caught out roaming, using the shuttle to snipe from a distance. Finally, darkness had fallen, and without enough light to continue working, everyone decided to settle in.

Ahern set two hour watches – he wanted everyone rested – of two people, and snatched himself five hours of nightmare ridden sleep, full of trees, dying marines, and explosions, along with memories of his childhood back in Germany, hauling copper power lines with bleeding hands and listening for the sound of the Höllenhund, mutated canines that liked to burst from the mutated wreck of the Black Forest to savage travellers.

He'd been awoken twice, once when Kahlee and Leng put down some hellishly warped version of a mountain lion, with slimy black fur and blind, pale white eyes. Later on, Saracino had fired several times, finally reporting dropping a fairly large crocodile trying to approach the shuttles.

Sunlight had finally allowed work to continue, as everyone's wounds were bandaged, suits were sealed inside and out as best as possible, and they'd managed to run the shuttle's water purifier and get refills. Food would start becoming a concern, but they still had extra rations taken from the slaughtered marine team the shuttle originally belonged to, so it wasn't time to start rationing yet.

When the radio had been repaired, Ahern had first gotten an exact GPS fix, and then contacted command for an update.

"Command, this is Captain Ahern, Fifth Solguard. With me is Lt. Anderson, Second Thanas, and Lt. Shepard, First Europa. We are currently in possession of a semi-functional shuttle, but some of the members of Shepard's team are dead and everyone is wounded. Current force strength is fourteen. We have water but only three days food left, and are running very low on medical supplies. Request tasking and ETA to recovery."

It had taken a good two minutes for someone to reply, and the voice that answered was unexpected. "Captain Ahern, this is Admiral Grissom. What is the exact status of your teams?"

Ahern winced. He knew why the man was asking _that_ question. "Neither my team nor Lieutenant Anderson's team has any fatalities. Anderson, Richards, Leng, Pellham, Kyle and Florez are lightly wounded. I have a couple of grazes. Sergeant Sanders is unhurt, as is Chief Saracino. Lieutenant Shepard's team has two dead, one seriously wounded, and the rest lightly wounded."

The admiral's gave a very short, relieved sigh. "And what's your exposure look like, son? And you're anti-rads?"

Ahern checked his film badge. "Edging into yellow-7, sir. We've popped all the anti-rad pills we have. As far as further exposure goes, it's not good, sir. Most of us have suit breaches, we've patched with saran wrap and field adhesive or duct tape where possible."

Grissom gave a bark of hard laughter. "Saran wrap? Someone's a clever bastard." A pause, muted voices in the background. "Alright, Captain, here's the situation. We found a pack of Unity Now activists who transmitted the location and flight paths of the training shuttles to EAGL. We've executed them, and now comms channels are being manned by Commissars. So comms, at least, are secure."

His voice turned grim. "But for right now, we – that is, you and your people – have two much bigger problems."

"The first is we sent in five hundred teams. Based on what we can see from satellite imagery and teams that managed to report in, sixty two teams were killed by the EMP blast or on crash landing. We had contact with another fifty-four teams that have ceased contact, and our estimates are, between exposure, damage from crashes, wild-life and EAGL, less than two hundred teams are still active. Most of those – about a hundred and ten teams – are in bad shape, some seventy miles east-southeast and almost into the Jacksonville Exclusion Zone."

Ahern winced. "That means they're taking kappa or theta bands of rads, sir?"

"Correct. On top of that, they're reporting heavy numbers of ABC war robots advancing on their positions, pushing them further into the Zone. They're holding their own, but … " The admiral's voice trailed off, then he cleared his throat. "There's not much time for them."

"Our primary concern at this point is moving as fast as we can to rescue those teams before radiation or war robots ends up killing them all. An overland column from Jacksonville and what limited shuttle capacity we still have are focusing on them. For very obvious reasons, I'd love to send a shuttle to pick your teams up – especially as you managed to complete the damned exercise despite this clusterfuck of a complication – but you're going to have to wait on that."

Anderson spoke up. "Admiral, this is Lieutenant Anderson. Ahern's team and mine are at Yellow-7 or in some cases Yellow-8, but all of Lieutenant Shepard's team is already at Orange-4. I'm not sure how much longer we ourselves can 'wait' given our situation."

Grissom's voice was quieter. "I know, David. There's probably sixty teams between the bulk of the marines crashed near the berm and the edges of the swamp, and EAGL is out in force. Until the gunships get here, I can't risk sending unarmed shuttles deep into the swamp without cover. A lot of good marines are going to die in the next twenty-four hours before we can do a full evac, but those teams near the Exclusion zone are already at Red-9 or worse."

Ahern glanced at Anderson, and the black man merely shook his head. If Grissom wouldn't bend even for his own daughter, the situation was probably not under his control any longer. "Understood, Admiral. We are making repairs to our working shuttle. If we can get it moving far enough to get to Jacksonville, we'll try to make our own way out."

There was a quiet, muffled conversation, and then Grissom's voice came back. "Son, if you can get my daughter out of there alive I'll make you a goddamned hero. My hands are tied, but I've had frigates bombarding the hell out of what EAGL positions we can see and hit. There's a group of three downed shuttles and six teams about ten miles south of your position, reporting sporadic contact with EAGL and influx of hostile wildlife. If you can get there and help them reinforce, it will be a lot easier for me to make the case that we need a rescue effort at that location."

Ahern nodded. "We'll do our best, sir. Anything else?"

Grissom's voice hardened. "Yes, and it's not good news. Like I said, two problems. Weather sats at Bahama Memorial Point just picked up a wailing wind. Looks like, based on the modeling we're getting from Alliance Meteorology, that an armada storm is building up a cell. I don't have good timing on this, but we're pretty sure it will be class five, possibly class six – winds up to a hundred and eighty miles per hour, carrying pollutants and theta or even sierra bands of radiation."

"If it forms, it will hit the Okefenokee in eighteen to thirty hours – if it's active...well, nothing can get through one of those, and if you're on the ground, you'll have to find solid cover."

Ahern closed his eyes. "Understood sir. We'll remain in contact. Ahern out."

Michael Shepard shook his head. "Well, if that storm comes in, we're _dead_. Nothing out here can take a big armada storm very well, even without the rads it will whip up."

Ahern nodded, pulling out his map. "So we need hard cover...there's some ruined towns and what not, south-west of here. That's moving away from anything in terms of civilization – pretty much from here to the Gulf is blasted to hell – but getting out of the path of that thing and into some kind of buildings might be our only shot."

Anderson frowned. "What about moving to the marine units the Admiral mentioned?"

Ahern nodded as he continued to peruse the map. "That's gambling. Even assuming the shuttle could make it, he said eighteen to thirty hours. If we're lucky then yeah – but it's a big fucking mess if we come up unlucky. My thinking is that if we head somewhere and hole up, maybe he can cut some shuttles and an escort to come get us after he's cleared the Zone."

He tapped the map. "The Gainesville Exclusion Zone runs all the way to old highway ten. We're .. here." He pointed to a spot on the map. "There used to be a town called Fargo just east of here..."

Shepard nodded. "We saw that on the way in. It's a mess, most of it sunk into the swamp when the ocean levels came up during the Wash. No real cover there."

Ahern grimaced. "South...Lake City. Huh. If the topography part of this map is right, there's some pretty substantial hills to the west of there a bit. And we pass right by the marines the admiral mentioned."

With a sigh, he rolled the map up. "Alright, so this is my thinking. Basically, we can fly the shuttle east toward the Jacksonville Exclusion Zone as far as we can until the engines give out and see where that puts us, and try to hike it in time to be part of the relief column pickup. Don't like that idea, because EAGL is probably headed in that direction too, and we'd be going into really bad radiation bands and ugly wildlife."

He tapped the map. "We could head south, see if the marines the admiral said were there are still alive, and then try to make it to Lake City. If there's some old fallout shelters or something, we can hole up and wait out the storm. If not, we can try to anchor the shuttle on the far side of a hill and fucking pray."

He looked at the two other officers. "Either of you got any other bright ideas?"

Shepard was eyeing the map, but shook his head. "Not really, Captain. Even if the shuttle was working at 100%, with my people on board along with two full teams we're overloading it. Given the condition it's in, we might get thirty, forty miles out of it, but not seventy or eighty, which is how far the main marine body is. We COULD make it all the way to the ruins of Gainesville, but that's some hard rads to take even if it would protect us from the storm."

Anderson folded his arms. "As much as I hate to say it, maybe we should head west to Valdosta after all, after the Alliance does its orbital bombardment. They've got to have some kind of rad-safe shelter there if they've been out here all this time."

Shepard shook his head. "No, EAGL mostly operates out of the collapsed arcology at Tallahassee. I doubt Valdosta is anything but a strong-point. And if they kinetically bombard the place, even if there is a rad-safe location, it might be breached after such an attack – or full of dug in EAGL. Too risky."

Anderson's mouth tightened into a grim line. "If we move south, and link up with these marines, we'll be out in the open with an A-storm on the way. That's more risky."

Ahern smiled. "So all of our choices are shit, basically. Jesus fuck, this is a mess. What in the hell is the Alliance doing?"

Anderson stood up from his crouch. "I don't know, but if Admiral Grissom can't even detail off a pair of shuttles to come pick up his own daughter...he may not be in charge of this evolution any more. The Commissariat – not to mention Command – must be furious at having the best of the Marines wrecked by a band of hooligans, and all the sovereign citizen bands and rebels will be eating this up and starting trouble elsewhere."

Ahern's eyes narrowed, and he went back to the radio. "VI, link to Alliance Tac Channel SA-6."

There was some hissing, then the automated system clicked over. " – advisory remains in effect until 0200 hours. All secondary combat units in Area Nineteen and Twenty are to report to stations. Commissariat units have declared martial law in Area Twelve. There is a combat advisory in position in Area Thirty Five. All forces in southern France are to go to condition Bravo immediately, riots reported in several locations. Commissariat forces have locked down the Calcutta Arcology due to riots. All secondary forces in Areas Fifty Five, Sixty Two, and Sixty Eight are to go to full combat alert. Riots reported in – "

Ahern cut the radio off. "Monkey-fucking sonsofbitches! Every rebel fuck from here to goddamned Africa must be up in arms."

Shepard looked at radio and sighed. "Sounds like the Alliance has its hands full. _Again_."

Anderson gave a short laugh at that, and Ahern squared his shoulders and took a deep breath. "Let's see what we can do with the marines down south – at the very least we need to make sure they don't get shot to pieces or fucking eaten by slug-cats."

Shepard blinked. "Slug-cats?"

Anderson headed for the hatch door. "Don't ask, lieutenant, trust me. Just...stay away from the trees."

It took another twenty minutes to pack everything away and get ready to move. The shuttle of Shepard's team had been field stripped of as much as possible, and the engines of their own shuttle were now in slightly better condition. The VI reported flight control was operation and, more importantly, the filtration and climate seals were functional.

That allowed everyone to at least take off their helmets and recharge air from the shuttle's filtered air draw system, as Pel ran through the flight checklist. With fourteen people on board a shuttle designed for ten, there was not much space left, but everyone held on to what they could as Pel lifted off.

"We're … ha. In the pipe, guidance operative, seven by five. Power levels are low but in the green. Gyros are actually working. Based on engine temps we have about … forty miles range. Give or take a goddamned random failure or two. Radar is clear, so what's the happ'n, cap'n?"

Ahern gave a lop sided smile. "South, mark one seven two. Keep us low, and if you get a hit of anything on the horizon call out and drop us to the ground. We'll keep the hatch closed for now, but be ready to button up and go hot, people."

Pel tapped several controls in a row, then wrapped his meaty hands around the flight stick. "And here we go."

Flying at very slow speeds to avoid over-stressing the engines any further, the shuttle crawled thirty feet above the tree-tops, moving south. Out the cockpit windows, Ahern could already see the sky to the west, filled with heavy clouds of a bruised purple color, and dozens of streamers of smoke rising to the sky – probably shuttle crashes or fires from combat, he figured.

Twice they passed scars of torn open earth, and shuttle impacts. One shuttle had literally come apart, the badly burned corpses visible even from a distance. The other shuttle was burning, riddled with bullet holes and blood seeping from the open hatch that more black smoke poured out of. Two corpses, that of women, were outside, stripped naked, beheaded and, from their twisted positions on the ground, likely violated.

Ahern's fist tightened. "EAGL bastards."

Kahlee nodded tiredly. "...my sister was a Marine scout attached to some of the localization cleanup crews working on the edge of the Jacksonville Exclusion Zone. They were just working on getting rid of contaminants and EAGL came out of nowhere, killed them all and … did things with the bodies." She closed her eyes and swallowed. "My father had a group of ships bombard Tallahassee for days, then they dropped waste eezo and every explosive they could on the place."

She gave a grim smile. "EAGL claimed we killed hundreds of 'innocent' women and children. My dad got on the radio, took responsibility, and then used the EAGL radio transmissions to find another group and firebomb them. Since then they've tried several times to sneak into the arcologies nearby and kill anyone from our family they can get their hands on."

Leng nodded grimly. "Someone in Dispatch has a loose mouth – it is possible they know she's out here."

Ahern shrugged. "Not to be a dick about it, but I think they'll try to kill us no matter who we are."

Kahlee nodded. "I know. Wasn't really my point. But … just remember. EAGL won't show _anyone_ any mercy. They think the Alliance is full of race-traitors and 'criminals', that the whole Fall was setup by the Illuminati or some such crap, that Ardiente was secretly working for Lord Manswell and all this other made up garbage. They're not sane and … not going to bother with _decency_."

Saracino's mouth twitched. "Decency is in short enough supply nowadays that I suspect their rations of it have gone quite out of date. But is there a point to this?"

Kahlee nodded. "They get recruits from some of the poorer types in the nearest arcologies, or people who can't afford hab fees. So they want publicity. They're probably going to try to go after any large gatherings of Marines they can catch. The more they … kill, well, the more they can brag about it. That means they probably won't find us if we keep moving south...assuming they can't home in on the radio."

Ahern nodded. "Good thinking. Chu, can you build a drone into a repeater? Doesn't have to be fancy dancy, just enough to bounce a signal? If we can fake them out as to where we're transmitting from, that might buy us more time. The last thing we need on top of a fucking armada storm is a pile of ABC War Robots."

The combat engineer, curled into a chair between the massive form of Richards and Kyle, nodded. "When we touch down at this group of marines, I can see if we can salvage from the other shuttles they came down in. I should be able to jury rig something up."

Ahern leaned back. "That'll have to do." He glanced out the tiny port at the swamp moving by outside, seeing the slimy green water thrash about as an alligator as long as the shuttle erupted to bite deeply into some kind of mutated bird, only to jerk in surprise as two smaller but still length crocs emerged and one bit into the alligator's flank.

"...Pel, if the shuttle looks like's the engines are going to fail, don't fucking put us in the water."


	12. Chapter 12

**Lions in Blue and Silver**

_The story of a last stand against darkness, and a light at the end of the tunnel.  
_

* * *

Ahern stared out the cockpit window, watching the rain fall in torrential sheets of water, flash-lit by the occasional lightning bolt. Heavy, bulbous clouds occluded the sky, thick, black and churning – and to the east, the sunlight failed before a wall of more angry black clouds. Lighting erupted constantly from the roiling mass of darkness, and the wind itself howled and rocked the shuttle as it tore past them.

He'd faced dangerous situations before, of course. Pinned down by rebels in Old Spain. Trapped on a transport holed by micro-mines, fighting pirates hand to hand with a goddamned knife. But the blackness in the east was simply Death, given tangible form. The oncoming armada storm towered into the heavens, a wall of endings, of the ultimate impotency of humanity to deal with the results of their own mad wars.

He glanced to his left, where Pel continued to pilot the shuttle, dark face set in an expression of concentration, then back at the GPS unit in his hand. "If this piece of shit is right, we should be coming up on the shuttles very soon. If it's wrong, who knows where in the fuck we are."

The black lieutenant grunted. "Shuttle's not gonna last much longer. I'm getting red lights on every damned indicator. So if that GPS is wrong, we won't be able to correct." He grimaced as the shuttle gave a sickening lurch, struggling with the control stick before leveling out. "Then again, we can tell we are headed south, so maybe it don't matter."

Ahern exhaled. "How much further can you nurse it?"

Pel's voice was both wry and bleak. "Shit, cap'n, _probably_ another ten, maybe fifteen miles. But this ain't no M44, once the engines go out on this bitch she flies about as good as a brick. And with the ADS all wonky, I can't promise shit. When it goes, we go down fast."

Ahern nodded, then turned as Chu called his name. "Keep us on this course. We'll see what happens."

Pel nodded, bringing the shuttle's nose up over the shattered boles of a massive oak. Below the ground was littered with rotted trees, the swampy water tainted red here and there were wildlife was torn apart by piranhas infesting the shallow muck.

Ahern shuffled back into the main shuttle compartment, which was crowded to capacity. Chu was standing by the door with Kai Leng, the other Asian holding up the scout binocs once possessed by a slain Marine team. Chu's own expression was tense. "Incoming EAGL, headed this way."

Ahern squared his shoulders, glancing around the cabin briefly. Kahlee's eyes were empty, her hands busy polishing a pair of throwing knives. Anderson leaned limply against his seat, leg and arm showing bloodied bandages. Florez was asleep on Saracino's shoulder, who was calmly readjusting his scope. Kyle was rigging up part of one of the safety harnesses to try and carry the GE minigun, while Richards was leaned back, heavily bandaged himself.

"How many, Yonis?"

Kai Leng answered, his already whispery rasp made colder by a trace of fear. "Multiple groups. Too many. Main body is about an hour, maybe hour and a half out – I count at least eight perhaps ten ABC war robots, well over fifty EAGL – and those are the ones visible." He glanced to the shattered terrain beneath them, and the blackened impact craters of several clearly destroyed shuttles. "Two smaller groups are flanking it – maybe twenty or so fighters in each one. They are headed the same way we are – to the gathering of marines."

He gestured to the horizon ahead, where thin lines of smoke rose into the sky. "You do not need a tracker to follow that smoke to its source." His voice sounded almost tired. "Unless we can dig in, or the Alliance sends help, this will be a _very_ short fight.

Ahern nodded, ducking back into the shuttle's cockpit and tapping at the comm controls. "Command, this is Captain Tradius Ahern, Fifth Solguard. We are coming up on the GPS fix for the marine group you described, but we have incoming EAGL forces in overwhelming amounts. Please advise, how copy?"

He waited for any voice to answer out of the howling static for almost twenty seconds before he realized he wasn't going to get a response. He gently set the mike down on the cradle, and glanced at Pel, who gave him an almost sad smile.

"So much for command helping out, then, I guess. Almost there."

Arcing over the treeline, the shuttle came into a vast, swampy clearly bracketed by some of the tallest, most twisted and gnarled black oaks Ahern had ever seen. Five shuttles were scattered across the ground – two crumpled and smoking wrecks, two more intact if damaged, and one landed and seemingly in perfect condition.

A group of marines were grouped up near the shuttles, weapons drawn, and an argument seemed to be going down. Ahern cursed. "Land us to one side, let's see what in fuck is going on now."

The battered shuttle came down swiftly enough, even if the landing was a touch rough. Ahern set his face and tapped Michael Shepard and Anderson on the shoulders as he came out of the cockpit. "Let's form up and see what the fuck is going on out there."

He exited the shuttle first, rifle in hand, and glanced across the mucky grounds of the clearing to the marines, which were divided into groups. The larger group numbered almost forty marines at a guess, and in front was a fierce looking marine captain with a long, leonine mane of hair and hard, gimlet eyes to match his narrow, sallow features. These marines looked battered, many were injured, and all of them had ugly expressions on their faces.

The other group of marines was much smaller, lead by a fierce looking woman with, oddly enough, the silvers of a medical officer rather than the blacks of combat troops. Behind her was a figure even larger than Richards, a heavyset Hispanic male who must have topped seven feet and who was wielding a recoiless rifle like it weighed nothing. Most of these marines were uninjured, and several more wore medical uniforms.

Both groups turned to face Ahern, Anderson, and Shepard, the hard looking fellow from the bigger group speaking up first. "What command?" His voice was harsh and rough, but had a clear ring of command to it.

Ahern raised his voice. "Captain Ahern, Fifth Solguard. With me are Lieutenants Anderson and Shepard. What's going on here, Captain...?"

The man glared hard at the woman, then straightened. "I see. I am being Captain Ivan Dragunov, First Solguard Command. We have elements of … more than a few squads, most of them sadly incomplete." His voice was rough, filled with strange accents – English probably wasn't his first language. The fact that he was a fairly high ranking Lord's son probably meant he didn't give a shit how people took his accent.

He made a disgusted gesture to his right. "This is Lieutenant Commander Vandefar. Medical. We are having a _disagreement_ of resource allocation."

The woman was beautiful in a cold fashion, like hardened steel. Her high cheekbones framed a face of seeming wisdom, which twisted into a sardonic grin. Her voice was as hard as her features, with a trace of English accents and the crisp pronunciation of an educated person.

"Yes. As to what is going on, Captain, we have a very ugly situation. My team's shuttle, as you can see, is in perfect condition. I suggested we load it up with the most severely wounded or radiated and evacuate then. The good captain here says those people are a waste and we should evacuate the healthy who are likely to survive to protect the Alliance."

Ahern blinked at that. "Great. Here's two problems with your ideas. One, we have multiple groups of EAGL incoming fast. They saw your shuttle wreckage...and probably the smoke. Two, we have an armada storm coming down on us in twenty hours. There's nowhere to fucking evacuate to."

Dragunov frowned as frightened whispers broke out before his handed descended in a chopping motion. "Silence!" He glanced back up, lips thinned. "We have been unable to contact Command – or rather, we are being able to send, but we have had no word. What is being done?"

Ahern managed not to wince. "The bulk of the Marine force landed INSIDE the goddamned exclusion zone for Jacksonville – they're sending armored columns and any spare shuttles to evacuate as many of them as they can before the storm hits. They don't have much time, so we basically got told they'd get to us if they could." He paused. "When I tried to contact them again, I got silence."

More murmurings broke out, and Vandefar's frosty expression hardened further. "All the more reason to use the good shuttle to evacuate the wounded."

Dragunov sneered. "As the captain is pointing out, to where? Some of these men will not survive the night, sad but hard truth." His eyes narrowed. "And I am expecting they would need doctor to keep them in health once they go?"

She lifted her chin. "No. I would be staying behind to aid in the defense... and hopefully keep some Marines alive." She glanced at Ahern. "Your shuttle is functional..."

He shook his head. "It's about dead, just getting here. Alright, listen up." He raised his voice. "We have a fuckton of bad guys coming this way, and an armada storm. I've looked at the fucking maps, there's no cover we can get to on foot in time. Even if we could, EAGL would catch up to us and kill us off bit by bit."

The marines quieted, for the most part, even as his own team filed out of the shuttle. "In fact, the only thing we have to shelter in is the damned shuttles. They probably aren't rated to take sierra rads for long, but they should be able to protect against kappa for at least a short amount of time."

Dragunov gave him an incredulous look. "Shuttles will be flung about like snow in first blizzard against armada storm."

Yonis Chu walked up next to Ahern and smiled. "Not if we can keep the mass cores going and lock ourselves down with gravitic fields. It should be possible – if we can keep them intact."

Vandefar frowned. "VI's are down on two of them, but we could conceivably reload from our own..." She tapped her helmet thoughtfully. "Though if we have that many incoming enemies...keeping them intact will be difficult."

A marine lieutenant folded his arms, his dark features visible through his faceplate set into tense lines. "How the fuck do we hold off a ton of war robots?"

Ahern glanced around the clearing, at the marines gathered, then raised his voice. "We fucking fight. Put the most seriously wounded in the shuttles. Use ours and the good shuttle and push them in a circle, use the wrecked ones as our cover." He looked up. "Snipers in the trees, heavy weapons behind the shuttles and flanking, and foxholes for the rest. CQB types off to one side, ready for a rush."

The lieutenant's voice held a trace of fear. "And what if – "

Michael Shepard snarled, the sheer hate in his voice lancing through the damp air. "Fuck what if. Those fucking animals massacred God only knows how many of us. They're coming right for us, and I for one ain't going out like a bitch, crying on my fucking knees. If they want me, they'll have to come and kill me, and I won't go alone."

Dragunov nodded. "Yes. It is clear this exercise has failed. All that now remains is vengeance. I would still prefer to evacuate with one shuttle...but we would not have enough to shelter everyone if we do that." His eyes flicked back and forth over the marines. "We fight."

The lieutenant shook his head. "That's bullshit. If you wanna stay and die that's fine, but we have a working fucking shuttle. I ain't going to just die so you all can – "

His words were cut off as Lt. Commander Vandefar drew her pistol and shot the man directly in the back of the head. Bright blood splashed out in an arc as he crumpled to the ground, and weapons came up all over the clearing. The woman shook her head and spoke, her voice just as hard as Dragunov's. "I'm ashamed that someone could be that weak, but to take even a single shuttle means you are condemning others to death. We have no choices but to fight our best."

A heavily built female sergeant, holding a shotgun, glared hard. "You killed him."

Dragunov snorted. "This is not game show, Sergeant Dah. Not being trite, but we fight or we die. Enough talk. We must prepare for incoming."

Ahern bit back a sarcastic rejoinder. "What have you been doing all this time?"

Dragunov sighed. "Force march and nursing shuttles to get here. No mattering now. We must work."

* * *

It took thirty minutes to fortify the clearing. Two huge trees were brought down by heavy weapons fire, crashing to the earth and shielding the bulk of the shuttles. Chu and a dozen other engineers were involved in tinkering with the VIs and shuttle mass effect cores, while marines dug fire pits, hastily cut down branches for barricades, and snipers climbed to likely vantage points.

The single undamaged shuttle was slowly used to push the other shuttles into a semicircle, then the VI was linked with heavy coaxial cabling between them. Ahern directed marines to build two lines of skirmishers trenches in the sloppy earth, lining them with broken branches and topping them with very hastily rough-cut tree trunks.

Further back, Richards and several other heavy weapons types were making primitive gun-pits using driftwood and branches. Proper foxholes or even abatis was impossible given the soft earth, but something was better than nothing.

Snipers on the edge of the clearing called out nearly forty minutes after work started. "Incoming! Three zero hostiles, seven ABC units. Bearing 022, ETA six minutes. Flankers present."

Dragunov's team, all heavy infantry, were dug in against the huge trunk of one of the black oaks. He glanced at Ahern, and then nodded. "Officers, we will split command sections. Captain Ahern, the left, if you would. Captain Okuda, the right. Lt. Commander Vandefar, the rear and oversee your medics, evacuate wounded to the shuttles. I will hold the center. Lieutenants, brace your teams and do not waver."

Ahern's voice was firm as he spoke. "These inbred hick fucks have killed our brother and sister marines. They've spat on the name of Victor Manswell and they detonated a goddamned nuke when the fucking planet is dying already. The only thing they deserve is a slow, painful death, but we're in a hurry so let's just kill the stupid fucks before the storm breaks."

Marines crouched, holding rifles and sighting in, even as the snipers in the trees began to fire. At first it was sporadic, then regular, and then the snipers were firing as fast as they could. Screams and the metallic impacts of damage to ABC robots could be heard, and counter fire.

A rocket of some kind detonated in the top of one tree, and two marine snipers were hurled from their perch. One was dead already, coming apart in burning chunks of armor and flesh, the other screamed as he fell almost fifty feet to land in a bloody, muck-laden splat on the swamp's unsteady ground, the audible snap of multiple bones breaking cutting his cry off suddenly.

Snipers began falling back, shimmying down trees or leaping to new ones. The howl of flechette miniguns rose into the air, and Dragunov's voice rang out above it. "They come. They will find us ready! I am Solguard. I will neither break nor bend. I am the hammer, the wrath of humanity! I am the point of the spear of the Lord! I am the gauntlet protecting the innocent, the flame that burns away the criminal, the light that illuminates the darkness. I am death, I am the end!"

The marines joined in the Litany of Hate as the first EAGL soldiers erupted through the treeline, and opened fire as one. Five of the EAGL soldiers went down in an instant as more began pouring through, firing as they came, some throwing grenades.

Ahern fired at one charging EAGL soldier wearing a thick woolen poncho crisscrossed with belts of old-fashioned gunpowder ammo, putting a red-trimmed hole in his chest and sending him to the ground. Two more rushed past their dying comrade to spray automatic fire from light machine guns into the firing lines of marines.

Kyle was firing the huge minigun, along with the other heavy weapons types, sweeping the treeline that now was spewing forth EAGL and ABC war robots both. One of the robots went down to a recoilless rifle hit, falling with a mechanical cry, but five others lifted their arms and fired in long streams, sweeping across the front ranks of the marines.

A female marine was hit and flung back from the shallow firing pit she'd dug, a fifth of her body mass simply eroded off in shredded flesh from the hit. The marines beside her sighted in on the EAGL flanking the war robot, taking them both down, even as minigun fire slammed into the machine, destroying it.

Dozens of streams of fire lashed back and forth between the two sides. Marine and EAGL alike went down in shrieks of pain or sighs of defeat. Blood trickled into the muddy terrain, splashed across makeshift cover. Splinters of wood, blasted from the trees due near misses showered down, and the sound of the EAGL's battle cries clashed with the snarled and spat lines of the Litany of Hate.

The screams of wounded EAGL and marines rose in sickening, eerie counterpoint to the howl of weapons, the breathy whispering sound of flames from ABC flamethrowers, and the constant hammering bangs of the sniper rifles. Another rush of EAGL soldiers ran screaming forward, hurling grenades to foul the defenses that had been hastily thrown together.

All eight of the EAGL soldiers died, but so did four marines, and two more crawled away wounded. Vandefar had her medic grab them and haul them away, then unshipped her rifle and slammed into cover next to Dragunov, eyes narrowed as she fired for effect.

A sniper's bullet smashed into one of the ABC war robot's sensors, an older A-model. The machine went crazy, firing in all directions with both minigun and flamer, cutting down its own forces. Two ABC's turned to open fire on the havoked machine, taking it down but exposing their less armored backsides to the marine firing line.

Ahern smiled as several marines focused fire on the leftmost ABC, driving shots through the weakened and rusted back armor to wreck the machine. The other turned ponderously but jerked and staggered as it was transfixed by two different miniguns, then went down with a splash.

Sections of the tree trunks being used for cover were smoldering now, as EAGL troops ducked behind dropped war robots for meager cover, screaming and firing wildly. "LIBERTY OR DEATH, FASCIST PIGS!" one screamed, firing an older but serviceable Lancer rifle, dropping one of Vandefar's medics carrying a wounded marine away.

Saracino's eyes narrowed as he fired, killing that man, then his sniper rifle swept right, barking every second as his hands moved. Five EAGL went down with perfect headshots, one them wearing light armor and some kind of rank striping. ABC war robots opened up on his position but he was already moving, cursing as flechettes tore through the canopy.

Ahern grimaced as Saracino was hit, loosing his footing and hold on his rifle and falling. A second later Michael Shepard was there, grabbing him in midair and landing in a rolling tackle that took most of the impact. He rolled clear, hastily checking Saracino's wound, before a pair of EAGL soldiers rushed the pair.

Shepard's shotgun came up and barked twice, one shot obliterating the soldier's head, the other catching a gutshot, which sent him to the ground screaming in agony. Shepard dragged Saracino out of the line of fire as other snipers opened up.

The sound of a shuttle was heard behind them, and Ahern glanced back. A shuttle was coming in from the east of all places, the doors open, and a large marine opened fire from the hatch with a minigun, catching dozens of EAGL soldiers in the back and by surprise.

By now almost all of the ABC's had been neutralized, and the EAGL lines wavered. Dragunov's voice lanced out. "Charge! CQB flank!"

A dozen close range marines erupted out of the carefully concealed pit they'd dug, hitting the EAGL in the flank. Kai Leng was in the lead, limping but flashing through the enemy ranks like a buzzsaw, his blade carving through one's face to bury itself into the back of another EAGL. Kahlee Sanders flung knives with dainty little motions that left them buried hilt deep in a trio of throats, ducking under a wild swing from another EAGL to blithely latch her knife into the man's eye-socket and tear it free.

More CQB lashed out with blades, even as the main marine body topped their own defenses and charged the wavering EAGL forces. Several marines were shot and two killed as they closed in firing, but many more EAGL were going down. The last of the ABC war robots shot two more marines to death before it was blown to shrapnel by combined heavy weapons fire, the ruined bulk collapsing backwards to crush yet another EAGL soldier under its bulk.

Florez gave a howl of exultation as she flung herself into a roll to avoid a burst of fire, then came up firing herself, dropping two soldiers with a single burst. Chu and Pel were behind her, firing short bursts, as Ahern shoulder checked an EAGL goon with a shotgun and blew his head off.

The fire from the shuttle flying overhead erupted again into a long stream of tracer rounds, tearing through the EAGL ranks even as they began to fall back. Ahern sighted in and killed another terrorist, hitting his knee first to immobilize him then shooting him in the chest. As he did so, five more marines opened up and a burst of fire rang out through the clearing.

Six more EAGL went down and the rest broke, stumbling back and firing wildly to cover their retreat. The snipers harried them with well placed shots while marines jeered and laughed, a few focusing instead on hauling away their wounded back to the semicircle of shuttles.

Ahern came carefully out of cover, his rifle still raised, and then glanced across the smoking, bloodied field at Dragunov. The slightly older man was, in turn, staring at the shuttle landing near the rest of them.

The shuttle was a heavier model than any used in the exercise, and the marines who stepped out of it were wearing heavier armor with specialty anti-rad face-masks. The lead figure was dressed in the gray armor of the AIS. "I'm looking for Captain Ahern."

Ahern stepped forward, even as the last fire died off in the distance behind him. "Here."

The man nodded, turning to his own people. "Hopkins, break out the beacon repeater. Vicks, get on the comms and tell them we found the marine group south." He turned back to Ahern. "Major Vaskins is my name, AIS military adjunct. We're here to get you people out. We received your message but were already on the way – we cannot be absolutely sure there are no more traitors in the comms system, so we did not respond."

Ahern felt relief flood his body, but frowned. "I thought command was going after the boys in the exclusion zone first."

The man's face twisted. "The storm surged faster than we expected. We got about sixty of the most heavily wounded out via shuttle...then the wailing wind picked up and started hurling theta rads at us. The ground transport's still on the way in but... we don't think we can get everyone clear. In any event it's too risky for shuttles, so we're doing our best to pick up the remaining teams with those."

Ahern nodded, then looked at Dragunov and Vandefar as they walked up. The woman was limping, a wound in her thigh tied off with a simple rag bandage, and she spoke. "Will we need to triage, Major? We have some here with exposure as high as Red-2 and nearly everyone is wounded, but some are going to die in the next few hours without treatment."

The major shook his head, as one of his people set up a slender antenna with a boxy looking module attached by thick cables. "No. We have sixteen shuttles, that should be enough to get everyone loaded. ETA is fifteen minutes. Form your people up by squads and lets get you the hell out of here."

Ahern turned at the sound of something in the brush, and his eyes widened as a single EAGL soldier, dressed in all black clothing, tore out of the treeline, weapon leveled at Kahlee Sanders. He fired just as Michael Shepard tackled the girl out of the way.

Nine marines opened fire, blowing the EAGL's arm, leg and most of head off. Kai Leng and Anderson both hustled over to Kahlee, who was slammed to the ground and covered in muck but otherwise unhurt.

Michael Shepard rolled on the ground, grimacing in pain as blood poured out of his side. He'd taken the shot meant for her, the heavy round driving into his hip. Kahlee wriggled up and snatched up her medical kit, tearing open the last bandage pack she had. "Shit shit shit! You didn't have to fucking do that!"

Shepard merely gritted his teeth while trying to smile. "...yeah well. Couldn't let you just die.."

Anderson knelt down beside the man, "...how bad is it, Kae?"

She shook her head as one of Vandefar's medics came up. "Bad. We need to get him to a hospital, I can't stop this bleeding." She glanced up. "We need to move him into one of the shuttles and get the armor off."

The medic, along with Anderson and Kai Leng, got Shepard moving towards the shuttle. Ahern watched it with narrowed eyes as Florez came up. She watched the little scene then gave a huffy snort. "Heroic little bastard, ain't he? Mike would have been dead if he didn't pull that tackle catch, probably."

Ahern nodded. "Yeah. How's he doing?"

The woman shrugged. "Dunno. We'll see what the docs say when we get the fuck out of here." She glanced around the clearing, at the twisted oaks, the towering stack of dark stormclouds in the east, the feeble trails of smoke and splashes of blood all around.

"Hundreds of marines are dead over this bullshit, Tradius. _Why_?"

Ahern's jaw tightened as he found he had no clear answer.


End file.
